Catalytic Pyrolysis of Rice Husk via Semi-Batch Reactor Using L9 Taguchi Orthogonal Array

Abstract

The market demand of bio-fuel is 11,8 billion litters based on recent reported data. Hence, with the high demand of bio-fuel, the bio-fuel production utilizing rice husk can be one of the solutions. Beside, bio-oil can be produced by pyrolysis process utilizing rice husk as the feedstock. In this research, the optimization condition in producing bio-oil from rice husk by catalytic pyrolysis process was studied. The effect of catalyst type (H-β, H-Y, HZSM-5), catalyst loading (1wt%, 5wt%, 12wt%), temperature (400-500°C) and flow rate (60-100ml/min) were investigated through repetitive experiments using L9 Taguchi Orthogonal Array. The highest liquid yield of 38wt% was obtained at the optimum conditions with temperature of 500°C with nitrogen flow rate of 60ml/min and 12wt% of H-ZSM-5.