Biomass Resources in

Pakistan &
Conversion Technologies

What is Biomass?

Biomass is biological material derived from living, or

recently living organisms. In the context of biomass for
energy this is often used to mean plant based material,
but biomass can equally apply to both animal and
vegetable derived material.

Chemical Composition
Chemical composition of Biomass Based on;

Carbon

Mixture of organic molecules i.e. H,O,N

Other small quantities (Alkali, Alkaline earth & heavy metals).

Why is biomass a renewable energy source?

Why Biomass is Preferred over Fossil Fuels?

Renewable/ Non Renewable Sources

Toxic/ Non-Toxic Emissions
Global Warming
Depletion with Time

Biomass Resources in Pakistan

Agricultural Residues
Wheat straw, rice husk, rice straw, cane trash, bagasse, cotton sticks are some
of the major crop residues in Pakistan.

Sugar cane:
During the year 2010-11, around 63,920,000 metric tons of sugarcane was
grown in Pakistan which resulted in trash generation of around 5,752,800
metric tons. As per conservation estimates, the bioenergy potential of cane
trash is around 9,475 GWh per year.

Cotton:
The production of cotton sticks during 2010-2011 was approximately
1,474,693 metric tons which is equivalent to power generation potential of
around 3,071 GWh.

Animal Manure:
Pakistan is the worlds fourth largest producer of milk. The cattle and dairy
population is around 67,294,000 while the animal manure generation is
estimated at 368,434,650 metric tons. Biogas generation from animal manure is
a very good proposition for Pakistan as the country has the potential to produce
electrical energy equivalent to 23,654 GWh

Municipal Solid Waste:

The generation or solid wastes in 9 major urban centers is around 7.12 million
tons per annum which is increasing by 2.5% per year due to rapid increase in
population and high rate of industrialization. The average calorific value of MSW
in Pakistan is 6.89 MJ/kg which implies power generation potential of around
13,900 GWh per annum.

Conversion Technologies

Thermal Conversion:
These are processes in which heat is the dominant mechanism to convert the
biomass into another chemical form.

Combustion:
Combustion is the process with which everyone is familiar by which flammable
materials are allowed to burn in the presence of air or oxygen with the release of
heat.

Combustion of Biomass material:

When the flammable fuel material is a form of biomass the oxidation is of
predominantly the carbon (C) and hydrogen (H) in the cellulose, hemicellulose,
lignin, and other molecules present to form carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O).

Gasification:
Gasification is a partial oxidation process whereby a carbon source such as coal,
natural gas or biomass, is broken down into carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrogen
(H2), plus carbon dioxide (CO2) and possibly hydrocarbon molecules such as
methane (CH4).

Low temperature gasification

If the gasification takes place at a relatively low temperature, such as 700C to

1000C, the product gas will have a relatively high level of hydrocarbons compared
to high temperature gasification

High temperature gasification

Higher temperature gasification (1200C to 1600C) leads to few hydrocarbons in
the product gas, and a higher proportion of CO and H2.

Pyrolysis:
Pyrolysis is the precursor to gasification, and takes place as part of both gasification
and combustion. It consists of thermal decomposition in the absence of oxygen. It
is essentially based on a long established process, being the basis of charcoal
burning.

Lower vs. higher temperature pyrolysis

Lower temperatures (around 400C) tend to produce more solid char (slow
pyrolysis), whereas somewhat higher temperatures (around 500C) produce a
much higher proportion of liquid (bio-oil), provided the vapor residence time is kept
down to around 1 sec or less. After this, secondary reactions take place and
increase the gas yield.

Biochemical conversion:
Biochemical conversion makes use of the enzymes of bacteria and other microorganisms to break down biomass. In most cases micro-organisms are used to
perform the conversion process;

Anaerobic digestion:
Anaerobic digestion (AD) is the process whereby bacteria break down organic
material in the absence of air, yielding a biogas containing methane.

Fermentation:
Fermentation is the process used in brewing and wine making for the conversion of
sugars to alcohol (ethanol CH3CH2OH). The same process, followed by distillation,
can be used to obtain pure ethanol (bioethanol) for use as a transport biofuel.

Transesterification:
This chemical conversion process can be used to convert straight and waste
vegetable oils into biodiesel.

Converting vegetable oils into biodiesel

Instead, SVO (Straight Vegetable Oil) and filtered waste vegetable oil (WVO) can
be reacted with methanol (or ethanol) to change the triglyceride esters into
methanol (or ethanol) monoesters, each with single fatty acid chains making fatty
acid methyl ester (FAME), commonly known as biodiesel.

Thank You