Sustainable Pelletisation of Buah Engkabang or Shorea Macrophylla Biomass Wastes as Fuel for Rural Sarawak"

• Main Author: Deny, Nerei
• Format: Final Year Project Report
• Language: English; English
• Published: Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) 2013
• Subjects: GE Environmental Sciences; TP Chemical technology
• Online Access: http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/37786/1/Deny%20Anak%20Nerei%20%2824%20pgs%29.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/37786/4/Deny%20Anak%20Nerei%20%28fulltext%29.pdf; http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/37786/

An alternative energy has been globally introduced as the promising sources in substituting fossil fuels for the energy diversification. As the source of renewable energy, biomass is determined to have potential in generating power supply and promoting low greenhouse gases (GHG) emission. The lower emission of GHG could reduce the negative impact of such gases to the environment. Malaysia as an agricultural country produces large amount of biomass waste annually. As such, the waste can be pelletised and use as fuel for heating or power generation purposes. Pellet is a solid fuel which is the compressed biomass material under high pressure into small cylindrical size. As such, this study main aim is to utilise shorea macrophylla cultivation wastes as raw material for pelletisation. Corresponding to the aim, a survey is conducted in order to investigate the cultivation of shorea macrophylla and the current disposal method practised by the farmers. In addition, the identified wastes are pelletised and the properties of the shorea macrophylla wastes pellet is tested and analysed especially in term of bulk density, pellet density, amount of fines, moisture content, calorific value and ash content. Overall, the produced pellets from shorea macrophylla biomass wastes have high calorific value and the pellets densities are comparable to European pellet standard and other types of pellets. The study also found that the moisture content of the produced pellets are lower in which have increased its calorific value. Although the bulk density is lower, and amount of fines and ash content are higher than other types of pellet, the quality of the produced pellets can still be improved for commercialisation. As such, it can be concluded that the produced pellets have the tendency to be utilised as fuel for not only heating purposes but for power generation as well.