Hydrogen production from co-gasification of Çan lignite and sorghum biomass in a fixed-bed gasifier: CFD modeling

Temperature, steam flow rate and coal/biomass ratio in the feedstock are the key factors that affect the performances of co-gasification processes. A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method matched with homogenous chemical reactions was used to visualize hydrogen concentration gradient in a fixed-bed reactor. The Eulerian–Eulerian CFD method was promoted to investigate the effects of various ranges of temperature (700–950 °C), water flow rate (0.5 × 10–8 to 3.3 × 10–8 m3/s) and coal/biomass ratio (0–100%) on the gasification efficiency. All numerical operations were under time-dependent conditions by depicting concentration contours for H2 production. Using the CFD technique, the desirable circumstances for maximum H2 production were specified as temperature of 850 °C, water flow rate of 1.9 × 10−3 m3/s and coal/biomass ratio of around 50%. A comparison between the simulation results and experimental gasification data was conducted to approve the CFD results, and there was an acceptable agreement among them.