Biocrude production from hydrothermal liquefaction of chlorella: Thermodynamic modelling and reactor design

Abstract

Hydrothermal liquefaction can directly and efficiently convert wet biomass into biocrude with a high heating value. We developed a continuous hydrothermal liquefaction model via Aspen Plus to explore the effects of moisture content of Chlorella, reaction pressure and temperature on thermodynamic equilibrium yields, and energy recoveries of biocrude. We also compared the simulated biocrude yield and energy recoveries with experiment values in literature. Furthermore, vertical and horizontal transportation characteristics of insoluble solids in Chlorella were analyzed to determine the critical diameters that could avoid the plugging of the reactor at different flow rates. The results showed that the optimum moisture content, reaction pressure, and reaction temperature were 70–90 wt%, 20 MPa, and 250–350◦C, respectively. At a thermodynamic equilibrium state, the yield and the energy recovery of biocrude could be higher than 56 wt% and 96%, respectively. When the capacity of the hydrothermal liquefaction system changed from 100 to 1000 kg·h−1, the critical diameter of the reactor increased from 9 to 25 mm.