A Proposed Method for Reliable Gasification Kinetics by Thermal Gravimetric Analysis

It has been shown in thermodynamic simulations of gasification that recycling up to 25% of carbon dioxide (CO₂) into a reformer allows for a highly hydrogen (H₂) concentrated syngas. While understanding thermodynamic limits is imperative, a kinetic analysis is desired to confirm applicability. Studies on thermal decomposition kinetics of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) in CO₂ gasification atmosphere have been assessed. Using thermal gravimetric analysis, we can show that gasification may be modeled as a series of single step reactions and determine the activation energies, pre-exponential factors and reaction models of those reactions. The use of CO2/air atmosphere instead of air atmosphere results in better char conversion.