Browsing by Author "Haghighi Mood, Sohrab"

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Biomass carbonization technologies
(Elsevier, 2022) García Pérez, Tsai; Peláez Samaniego, Manuel Raúl; García Núñez, Jesús Alberto; García Pérez, Manuel; Haghighi Mood, Sohrab; Yadama, Vikram
Biomass carbonization is practiced extensively all over the world, with technologies resulting in chars covering a wide range of properties and yields. Although the number of papers published in this area is growing fast, mostly with contributions from Europe, the Unites States, and Brazil, there are very few reviews on the hurdles and challenges of carbonization. Char is mostly used as cooking fuel in developing countries and as a reduction agent for the metallurgical industry in Brazil. Since the 1970s, there has been a lot of interest in producing bio-oil from biomass for transportation fuels, and consequently, fast pyrolysis reactors were developed, scaled up, and deployed. This is an area of great research activity that will not be discussed in this review. More recently, there is a growing global interest in using char as soil amendment for sequestering C to fight global warming. This interest is fueling the development of selective carbonization units maximizing C conversion efficiency. The production of large volumes of cheap chars via selective carbonization could catalyze the growth and deployment of a green C economy resulting in the production of green fuels, green chemicals, and materials. In this chapter, we review old and new carbonization reactor design concepts. Reactions and operation parameters responsible for char yield and properties are also reviewed.
Perspectives of engineered biochar for environmental applications: a review
(2022) García Pérez, Manuel; Haghighi Mood, Sohrab; Peláez Samaniego, Manuel Raúl
Research on using biochar for environmental applications has witnessed unprecedented advances in the past decade. Biochar is universally considered one of the best alternatives to store carbon to fight global warming. Thus, the sequential use of biochar in environmental remediation compatible with carbon sequestration is receiving growing attention. One of the reasons for such huge interest is the possibility to engineer biochar with targeted properties (e.g., surface area and chemistry) relevant to existing environmental issues. These properties can be achieved by selecting appropriate raw materials, processing conditions, carbonization technology, and the possibility of selecting postproduction modification approaches. The objective of this review is to summarize strategies to enhance biochar properties relevant to its use in environmental services (e.g., water purification, air/gas cleaning, construction materials, soil amendments) and the corresponding results on the use of this material for these applications. The main methods for enhancing biochar properties for environmental applications reviewed include activation (physical and chemical), oxidation, metal and metal oxide modification, metal-free heteroatom doping, and biological modification. Both modified and unmodified biochars have been used for soil amendments as adsorbents of pollutants in the aqueous phase (e.g., removal of P and N, heavy metals, and organic pollutants), adsorbents of pollutants in the gas phase (e.g., biogas cleaning), as a catalyst, as an additive for improving anaerobic digestion, and as an admixture to cementitious/construction materials, with promising results in all cases. New opportunities for using biochar are being reported as the science of biochar production, modification, and use advances.