He Zigan, Wang Cong, Han Jianing, Zhai Lianbao, Zhu Jian, Kou Jiajing
This study employed rice husk as the native biomass and investigated the effects of reaction temperatures (350- 500 ℃), concentrations (1%-4%), and an alkali metal catalyst (K2CO3) on the performance of supercritical water gasification for hydrogen production. Experimental results indicated that increasing reaction temperature and decreasing reactant concentration could effectively enhance the carbon gasification efficiency (CGE) and reduce the coking rate of rice husk. Under non-catalytic conditions, the optimal conditions for supercritical water gasification of rice husk were identified as 500 ℃ and 1%, achieving a CGE of 37.6% and an H2 selectivity of 48.3%. Although the supercritical water environment facilitates the dissolution and hydrolysis of biomass, providing ample water to strengthen gas production reactions such as steam reforming and water-gas shift reaction, coking during gasification of rice husk remains an intractable issue that impedes its further gasification. The addition of K2CO3, however, significantly diminished the formation of coke. Under the optimal conditions, the CGE of rice husk achieved 49.2%, with total gas yield reaching 58.70 mol/kg. The residual solid, as analyzed by Thermogravimetric Analysis, was virtually carbon-free, indicating that the alkali metal catalyst may intensify the hydrolysis of rice husk, thereby promoting the transference of carbon from the feedstock to the gaseous and liquid phases. In addition, K2CO3 exhibited excellent H2 selectivity for gasification of rice husk, with an H2 selectivity of 71.0%. And the yield of H2 also reached 41.66 mol/kg, which was 3.5 timses higher than that under the non-catalytic conditions. The experimental results demonstrated the potential for producing hydrogen-rich gas through K2CO3 which catalyzed supercritical water gasification of rice husk.