Comparison of the physicochemical characteristics of bio-char pyrolyzed from moso bamboo and rice husk with different pyrolysis temperatures

Abstract

Bio-char pyrolyzed from biomass waste has been notably applied in various industries due to its versatile physicochemical characteristics. This paper investigated the difference of the properties of the bio-char derived from moso bamboo and rice husk under different pyrolysis temperatures (200 °C to 800 °C). As the temperature increased, the bio-char yield for both bamboo bio-char (BC) and rice husk bio-char (RHC) decreased, while the carbon element content and fixed carbon, the value of higher heating value (HHV) and pH increased for both BC and RHC. At 800 °C, BC had a higher HHV of 32.78 MJ/kg than RHC of 19.22 MJ/kg, while RHC had a higher yield of char (42.99 wt.%) than BC (26.3 wt.%) because of the higher ash content (47.51 wt.%) in RHC. SiO2 was the dominant component in the ash of RHC, accounting for 86.26 wt.%. The surface area (SBET) of RHC (331.23 m2/g) was higher than BC (259.89 m2/g). However, the graphitization degree of BC was higher than RHC at the same temperature. The systematic study on the evolution of the basic properties of BC and RHC will provide a good reference for their high value-added application.