Devolatilization Behavior and Pyrolysis Kinetics of Rice Husk

Abstract

This study presents the pyrolysis processof rice husk using a thermogravimetric analyzerin nitrogen atmosphere. the samples were heated over a range of temperature from 29 to 906 oc with three different heating rates of 10, 20 and 30 oc min-1. the results of thermal decomposition process show three main stages such as water removal, main devolatilization and continuous slight devolatilization. it isalso showed that as the heating rates increases from 10-30oc/min, maximum weight loss shifted to higher peak temperatures. the model free methods of kissinger-akahira-sonuse (kas) and kissinger were applied to the experimental data, generating kinetic parameters such as activation energy and pre-exponential factor.the average activation energy and pre-exponential factor calculated from kas method are 73.64 kj/mol and 9.10×106 min-1, respectively while the activation energy and pre-exponential obtained for kissinger method are 67.12 and 2.54×105 kj mol-1, respectively. thetga kinetic resultscan be used for better understanding of the composition of the devolatilization process at different temperatures thereby providing data for effective design of a pilot plant which can be effectively scale up.