Catalytic pyrolysis of lignocellulosic bio-packaging (jute) waste – kinetics using lumped and DAE (distributed activation energy) models and pyro-oil characterization S. Poddar, a S. De b and R. Chowdhury * a The present study concentrates on the catalytic pyrolysis of a waste bio-packaging material, namely, jute, under iso-thermal and non-isothermal conditions using a 50 mm diameter and 164 mm long semi-batch pyrolyzer and a TGA set-up, respectively. The temperature range of pyrolysis is 673 K to 1173 K. Alumina, zinc oxide, sodium chloride, potassium chloride, and sodium aluminosilicate have been used as the catalysts. The patterns of the yields of all products of non-catalytic and catalytic pyrolysis under isothermal conditions have been compared. Lumped kinetics have been determined using the data of iso-thermal experiments. Alumina has been selected as the best performing catalyst showing the highest pyro-oil yield and lowest activation energy. The pyro-oil of catalytic pyrolysis has higher and lower contents of carbon and oxygen, respectively, and a more acidic pH in comparison to the non-catalytic counterpart. The kinetics of non-isothermal pyrolysis with and without alumina have been determined using a distributed activation energy (DAE) model. While the activation energies of non-catalytic pyrolysis follow a Gaussian distribution over a wide conversion range (0.2 to 0.8), no such pattern is obtained for catalytic (alumina) pyrolysis. The pyro-oils of both catalytic and non-catalytic pyrolysis have been analyzed using GC/MS and many components of industrial applications have been identi fied. Introduction In the context of both energy security and climate change mitigation, biomass is of major interest as a renewable energy source. In recent times, agricultural residues, municipal solid wastes, 1,2 vegetable wastes like Pungam oil cakes, 3 jute waste, 4–6 soybean, 7 rapeseed, 8 sunower oil cake, 9 cotton based textile wastes 10 and energy crops have attracted great attention as alternative energy sources. In India, jute fabric is used as an eco- friendly lignocellulosic bio-packaging material particularly for food-grains and sugar 11,12 and a large portion faces disposal problems. Although a few studies have been reported on ‘waste to energy’ processes 13–16 using jute wastes, more focus should be given to explore this possibility. Energy rich clean fuels may be generated from biomass through thermochemical conversion processes like pyrolysis, gasication etc. Pyrolysis, also known as thermolysis, is a process of thermochemical decomposition which generally leads to the generation of pyro char, pyro-oil and pyro-gas of smaller molecular weights. Pyrolysis is con- ducted in an oxygen decient environment in the temperature range of 400–900  C. The distribution of product yield may be changed by the adjustment of pyrolysis temperature. The pyro- oil obtained through pyrolysis is particularly attractive as it may be blended with petroleum crude or may be used as an auto- mobile fuel aer upgradation. Similar to coal tar, pyro-oil may also be used as a source for different valuable chemicals. Thus pyrolysis may be used as a potential process to be used in bio- reneries to generate fuel and chemicals simultaneously from biomass. One of the main shortcomings of pyro-oil is its high oxygen content. 13,17 Catalytic pyrolysis usually produce upgra- ded liquids. 13,18 From the literature review, it is clear that a few metal salts and oxides may serve as catalysts in pyrolysis of biomass. 19,20 From the chemical engineering view point, a cata- lyst usually changes the rate of a reaction by the promotion of a different molecular path leading to lowering of activation energy and hence can inuence both the yield and selectivity. 21 As the catalytic reactions occur at the uid–solid interfaces, porosity of the solid also alters the overall rates. In a pyrolysis process, an array of series–parallel reactions occur simulta- neously. Although lumped kinetics are usually used for the analysis of data under isothermal conditions, 22 DAE models are usually appropriate to represent the behavior of pyrolysis of biomass under non-isothermal conditions. This model can account for difference in behavior of pyrolysis of constituent molecules like cellulose, hemicelluloses and lignin through a distribution of activation energy at different conversion levels. Therefore, DAE models should also be attempted for catalytic pyrolysis of biomass under non-isothermal condition. However, a Jadavpur University, Department of Chemical Engineering, Kolkata-700032, India. E-mail: ranjana.juchem@gmail.com b Jadavpur University, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kolkata-700032, India Cite this: RSC Adv. , 2015, 5, 98934 Received 9th September 2015 Accepted 25th October 2015 DOI: 10.1039/c5ra18435e www.rsc.org/advances 98934 | RSC Adv. , 2015, 5, 98934–98945 This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2015 RSC Advances PAPER Published on 28 October 2015. Downloaded by Jadavpur University on 19/11/2015 12:03:54. View Article Online View Journal | View Issue