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Fuel properties and combustion kinetics of hydrochar derived from co-hydrothermal carbonization of tobacco residues and graphene oxide

Biomass Conversion and Biorefinery volume 10, pages 189–201 (2020)Cite this article

Abstract

Tobacco residues produced from domestic cigarette industry are an abundant biomass resource which have the potential to be exploited and utilized as solid fuel. In the present study, a comprehensive investigation was performed on the fuel properties of hydrochars which were derived from hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) of tobacco residues in the presence of minute amount of graphene oxide (GO). The effect of HTC temperature and residence time on the chemical compositions, structure, and combustion performance of the resultant GO-assisted hydrochars was evaluated. The carbon content and energy densification increased with the hydrothermal treatment intensity accompanying with the decline in hydrogen and oxygen contents. Meanwhile, the combustion behavior of hydrochars was analyzed based on the thermogravimetric curves and isoconversional Kissinger-Akahira-Sunose method. The activation energy varied with conversion degrees for the tested samples, indicating the complexity of hydrochar combustion. Notably, the decreased activation energies for GO-assisted hydrochars may indicate the catalytic role of GO during the combustion process of components in hydrochars.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the CNTC’s projects (No. 110201401018), the Key Scientific Research Projects of Henan Province Universities (No. 17B550006), and the Doctoral Research Foundation (No. 2014BSJJ067) of Zhengzhou University of Light Industry.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Zhengzhou Tobacco Research Institute of CNTC, Zhengzhou, 450001, China

    Miao Liang, Ke Zhang, Bing Wang & Bin Li

  2. School of Food and Biological Engineering, Zhengzhou University of Light Industry, Zhengzhou, 450002, China

    Miao Liang

  3. R&D Center of Yunnan Industrial of China Tobacco Industry Co., Ltd., Kunming, 650231, China

    Ping Lei

  4. Graduate School of Engineering Science and Technology, National Yunlin University of Science and Technology (YunTech), Douliu, Taiwan

    Chi-Min Shu

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  1. Miao Liang
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  4. Bing Wang
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Correspondence to Bin Li.

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Liang, M., Zhang, K., Lei, P. et al. Fuel properties and combustion kinetics of hydrochar derived from co-hydrothermal carbonization of tobacco residues and graphene oxide. Biomass Conv. Bioref. 10, 189–201 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13399-019-00408-2

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