International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Volume 9, Issue 2, February-2018 632 ISSN 2229-5518 IJSER © 2018 http://www.ijser.org SEM-EDS Analysis of Portland Cement and Sugarcane Bagasse Ash Collected from Different Boilers of Sugar Industry Chidanand Patil, P.B.Kalburgi, M.B.Patil, K.B.Prakash Abstract— When sugar cane is crushed in the milling plants of the sugar factories for extracting its juice, the fibrous residue left over after the extrac- tion of juice is known as bagasse. Bagasse is a mixture of hard fibre, with soft and smooth parenchymatous (pith) tissue, having hygroscopicity, soil, wax, sugar etc. When bagasse is used as fuel in the combustion boiler of cogeneration plant under controlled burning, a reactive amorphous silica, known as sugarcane bagasse ash (SBA) is formed. In the present study, micro structural observations and elemental analysis of Portland cement (OPC) and sugarcane bagasse ashes collected from four different sugar factories are carried out. Out of these four factories, three are located in the region of north Karnataka state (Chikodi, Vijayapur, M.K.Hubli) and one in Maharashtra state (Ichalakaranji) are studied. These ashes are represented as BA-C (Chikodi), BA-V (Vijayapur), BA-M (M.K.Hubli) and BA-I (Ichalakaranji). The microstructural observations were made using Scanning Electron Micro- scope (SEM) and elemental compositions were analyzed by Energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS). As indicated by SEM results, the OPC and all the sugarcane bagasse ashes presents different microstructure. On the other hand EDS map shows calcium as predominate element in OPC and silicium in all the bagasse ashes. Index Terms— Sugarcane bagasse ash, microstructure, elemental analysis, Portland cement, SEM-EDS, Temperature ——————————  —————————— 1 INTRODUCTION In recent years, the research related to agricultural wastes is intensifying with the aim of evaluating their potential for re- cycling as well as the elimination of the landfills. In this re- search li ne, the works are focused mainly on the sugar cane wastes. Sugarcane is the most profitable crop as compared to the crops like wheat, paddy and cotton. This has led to expan- sion of sugarcane in Maharashtra and Karnataka despite these states being water stressed. When sugar cane is crushed in the milling plant of sugar factories for extracting juice, the fibrous residue left-over after the extraction of juice is known as ba- gasse and in some countries is known as migasse. The term bagasse is derived from the French and Spanish word “bagazo” given to the husks of grapes or olives (waste materials) left over after extracting their contents by pressing [1]. All industry like sugar, pulp and paper, fertilizers, textiles etc. require large quantities of electric power and economics of cogeneration depends on the availability of cheap source of fuel. All cogeneration activities in sugar factories have evolved methods of using bagasse more effectively to generate steam and consequently, electric power more efficiently and econom- ically. Bagasse, being a sulphur free fuel (unlike coal, petrole- um fuels which contain lot of sulphur) its usage as fuel is an environmental friendly technology. The capital cost of power generation in sugar factories is much lower than power gener- ation in conventional power stations. Sugarcane bagasse has an intricate structure, and is basically made out of 25% lignin, 25% hemicellulose and 40–50% cellu- lose [2]. Sugarcane bagasse is utilized as fuel in the cogenera- tion procedure to create steam and power in sugar businesses. At the point when bagasse is singed in ignition evaporator under controlled burning, amorphous silica is formed in the remaining ash. In the wake of consuming, bagasse fiery re- mains is gathered as a result from cogeneration evaporator [3]. Quantity of ash generated is of the order of 0.3% of the weight of sugarcane crushed in the factory i.e. if 500000 tonnes of sugarcane is crushed in a season, the total ash produced is of the order of 1500 tonnes [1].Table 1 presents state wise number of factories operation in India. Table 1: State wise number of factories operation in India States 2010-2011 2011-2012 2012-2013 Andhra Pradesh 37 37 36 Bihar 10 11 11 Chhattisgarh 3 3 3 Gujarat 19 19 18 Haryana 14 14 14 Karnataka 59 58 60 Goa 1 1 1 M.P 13 13 12 Maharashtra 167 170 172 Punjab 16 17 16 Rajasthan 1 1 1 T.N and Pondi- cherry 46 45 45 U.P Central 49 49 49 U.P East 42 42 40 U.P West 34 33 33 Uttarakhand 10 10 9 W.B 6 6 6 All India 527 529 526 Duration of crushing season (days) All India 136 137 126 Production of sugar (Lakh Tonnes) All India 243.94 263.42 251.41 IJSER