Solar assisted gasification: Implementation and systematic analysis

Waste-to-Energy through gasification is a two-sided solution to the threat of fossil fuel depletion as well as the environmental impact of methane and carbon dioxide emissions from landfills. This is a rewarding practice because it generates a renewable and sustainable energy source from waste (industrial, medical, municipal) that is accounted for as energy and emission negative. In this work, we examine intermediate and high temperature conversion technologies that utilize thermo-chemical processes to convert the chemical energy of carbonaceous waste and byproducts into useful high value products, in the form of syngas, chemicals, or direct power. This work tackles the issue of storing solar energy into chemical energy in the form of syngas that can be used to generate high energy transport fuel using well developed technologies such as Fisher Troup's. The aim of this work is to systematically simulate solar assisted gasification process and reach a fundamental understanding of the technology applied to a baseline and three candidate waste streams. These feedstocks are experimentally analyzed for their proximate and elemental waste composition utilizing advanced analytical tools including Simultaneous Thermal Analyzer (STA), Par600 bomb calorimeter, and CHONS-5 elemental analyzer (FLASH). This work includes: i) A review of the gasification modeling and the challenges of integrating solar power via concentrated solar receivers and ii) Systematic analyses and their metrics (conversion and exergy efficiencies). Coal, tire, petroleum coke, and construction wood are studied as they are subjected to solar concentration which drives the endothermic conversion process.