Internal combustion engines tolerant to tar-containing producer gas are disclosed. Two concepts are described. The engines are tolerant to producer gas from a biomass gasifier with minimal pretreatment. When biomass is gasified to be burned for power generation or to be used to synthesize chemicals such as biofuels, a large fraction of the installation cost is spent on equipment to clean up the heavy organic components (also referred to as tars) from the gas stream, hereafter referred to as producer gas. The invention described herein may be used to enable power generation from gasified biomass with minimal treatment. It may also be used to treat biomass at a very low cost for other uses such as synthesizing chemicals. The producer gas is not necessarily limited to biomass derived. Producer gas derived from coal or other sources has similar issues and the invention described herein would be equally applicable.

A method is provided for thermally processing waste to produce steam and generate energy while minimizing air pollutants in a staged thermal reactor. The method includes gasifying the waste to convert the waste to a fuel gas and a substantially carbon free, inert, granulated, sintered mineral ash and reforming the fuel gas auto-thermally to minimize creation of nitrogen oxide when the fuel gas is combusted. The method further includes burning the reformed fuel gas to minimize creation of nitrogen oxide in a flame region of a fuel gas burner and recirculating cooled flue gas to control oxygen content and temperature during the reforming operation and the burning operation. In one example, reforming the fuel gas converts non-molecular nitrogen species into molecular nitrogen in an auto-thermal non-catalytic reformer unit by decomposition reactions promoted by a prevailing reducing gas atmosphere.

A method and apparatus is described for reformulating raw gas and/or reducing and/or converting the tar in a raw gas from a gasification reaction. More specifically, a gas reformulating system having a gas reformulating chamber, one or more sources of or means for generating non-equilibrium plasma, and optionally one or more oxygen source(s) inputs and control system is provided. Methods of reformulation and/or reducing the tar concentration in a raw gas from a gasification reaction that uses non-equilibrium plasma are also provided.

An apparatus is provided that receives waste and generates electrical power or thermal energy with minimal NOx emissions. A gasifier is provided that receives the waste and air to produce fuel gas for delivery to a fluidly coupled reformer. The reformer receives the fuel gas, recycled flue gas, and air to auto-thermally produce a reformed fuel gas and destroy fuel gas pollutants at a first temperature without a catalyst. A burner is fluidly coupled to the reformer and receives recycled flue gas and air to oxidize the reformed fuel gas at a second temperature that prevents nitrogen oxide formation, the second temperature being lower than the first temperature. A quench chamber is fluidly coupled to the burner and receives flue gas from the burner for quenching with recycled flue gas. A heat recovery system is fluidly coupled to the reformer, burner, and quench chamber to extract usable energy.

A method and apparatus for cooling hot gas streams in the temperature range 800 C. to 1600 C. using multi-stage circulating fluid bed (CFB) coolers is disclosed. The invention relates to cooling the hot syngas from coal gasifiers in which the hot syngas entrains substances that foul, erode and corrode heat transfer surfaces upon contact in conventional coolers. The hot syngas is cooled by extracting and indirectly transferring heat to heat transfer surfaces with circulating inert solid particles in CFB syngas coolers. The CFB syngas coolers are staged to facilitate generation of steam at multiple conditions and hot boiler feed water that are necessary for power generation in an IGCC process. The multi-stage syngas cooler can include internally circulating fluid bed coolers, externally circulating fluid bed coolers and hybrid coolers that incorporate features of both internally and externally circulating fluid bed coolers.

The invention is directed to a process to prepare ethylene and propylene from a biomass feedstock wherein the process comprises the following steps: (a) a mild gasification of a torrefied biomass feedstock thereby obtaining a char and a gaseous fraction comprising hydrogen, carbon monoxide and a mixture of gaseous organic compounds; (b) a severe gasification of the gaseous fraction in the absence of the char to obtain a substantially tar-free syngas; (c) a Fischer-Tropsch reaction of the substantially tar-free syngas to obtain a first product mixture comprising of methane and C2+ aliphatic hydrocarbons, and (d) a steam cracking reaction of all or part of the C2+ aliphatic hydrocarbons obtained in step (c) to obtain a second product mixture. Methane as isolated from the first and/or the second product mixture may be combusted to generate heat for the endothermal steam cracking reaction in step (d).

A system for processing carbonaceous in-feed material has a pyrolyzer kiln for pyrolysis the carbonaceous in-feed material, the kiln operating in a slow pyrolysis process in which the in-feed material is pyrolyzed in the kiln for a period of minutes in order to produce primarily a gaseous output fraction; a steam reformer positioned downstream of the kiln to which combustion gasses from the pyrolyzer kiln are fed; a water scrubber positioned gas flow-wise downstream of the steam reformer; a methanation stage; a CO2 scrubbing stage. The system includes means for splitting the gas and directing a portion of the split gas back to the pyrolyzer kiln.

A syngas generator provides a pyrolysis chamber and a steam cracking unit within a heater. A conveyor such as an auger directs input through the pyrolysis chamber where a pyrolysis reaction at about 600 C releases a gas/vapor mixture which is directed through a manifold and through an ejector into the cracking unit which operates at about 1200 C. Syngas from the cracking unit can be cooled, used for co-generation power systems, generate steam, and/or be burned (possibly combusted to generate electricity) with the heat used to heat the heater.

The invention is directed to a process to prepare a char product and a syngas mixture comprising hydrogen and carbon monoxide from a solid biomass feed comprising the following steps: (i) performing a continuously operated partial oxidation of the solid biomass feed at a gas temperature of between 700 and 1100 C. and at a solids residence time of less than 5 seconds, (ii) continuously separating the formed char particles as the char product from the formed gaseous fraction and (iii) subjecting the gaseous fraction obtained in step (ii) to a continuously operated partial oxidation and/or to a steam reforming to obtain the syngas mixture. The solid biomass feed has been obtained by torrefaction of a starting material comprising lignocellulose and is a sieve fraction wherein 99 wt % of the solid biomass particles is smaller than 2 mm.

A gasification furnace for gasifying a biomass resource in a manner producing a low quantity of tar. The gasification furnace (10) is provided with a punching plate (11) partitioning the furnace interior into upper and lower spaces; a biomass resource supply port (10a) for supplying the biomass resource over the punching plate (11); a first oxidizer supply port (10c) and a second oxidizer supply port (10d) for supplying an oxidizer into the furnace; a first oxidizer supply path supplying the oxidizer from the first oxidizer supply port (10c) from above towards below the punching plate (11); a second oxidizer supply path distributing and supplying to a plurality of locations within a predetermined area in the vicinity of the punching plate (11) from the second oxidizer supply port (10d); and a dry distillation gas output (10b) for discharging dry distillation gas generated by the pyrolysis and partial oxidation of the biomass resource on the punching plate (11) to the outside.