Establishing auto gasification of tea waste

Abstract

Worldwide in the 19th and 20th century, tea production and consumption became more commercialized and improved with the familiarization of temperance movement. The temperance movement was focused on reducing the consumption of alcohol and switching over to a new beverage. In India, the temperance movement was closely tied with the Indian independence movement. Nationally 5,66,660 hectares of land is extensively used for the cultivation of tea which produces an average of 1250 million tonnes/year of tea dust. From this, 0.015 million tonnes/year of tea waste is generated. Currently, the tea waste is being disposed along with the sewage waste which increases the soil acidity level. The widespread application of tea waste on soil leads to impairment of soil fertility. This paper attempts to use tea waste as feedstock for gasification, since combustion route requires a large quantum of waste which is not possible in the Indian context. The TGA study of tea waste proved that auto gasification is possible with tea waste. The auto gasification is a thermo-chemical process which converts solid combustible matter into combustible gaseous product with bio oxygen only. The bio oxygen content of tea waste is high. Hence auto gasification has been established. A detailed proximate and ultimate analyses of tea waste have been also carried out and reported in the paper.