No abstract

No abstract

Low grade biomass fibre produced as a by-product from the flax industry was manufactured into a non-woven fabric. This material was then pyrolysed in a fixed bed reactor to produce biochar. The resulting biochars were characterised using a variety of techniques including gas adsorption, scanning electron microscopy, pychnometry and elemental and proximate analyses. The fibrous morphology of the precursor was retained during pyrolysis. The temperature of pyrolysis had a significant influence on the biochar properties, with higher temperatures causing an increase in surface area and density along with a decrease in volatile/disorganised carbon. All of the biochars were microporous, with the majority in the ultramicropore size range. Activated diffusion effects were observed during nitrogen adsorption measurements at 77K. The experimental data show that the flax biochars exhibit properties typical of biochars produced from other lignocellulosic precursors.

Waste biomass flax fibre was manufactured into a non-woven matting material. The fibrous matting was pyrolysed and chemically activated using potassium hydroxide to produce an activated carbon matting. Changes in the activation process conditions showed that increases in chemical loading, activation time and activation temperature generally resulted in greater pore volumes and higher surface areas but a reduction in carbon yield. The preparation temperature of the char precursors showed that lower temperature chars produced carbons with higher porosity but lower yield than chars produced at higher temperatures. The end product activated carbon matting had surface areas of up to 1800 m2/g with a mainly microporous size distribution (pores of <2 nm diameter), but the process conditions could be manipulated to produce a highly microporous or a mixture of microporous and mesoporous (2–50 nm pore diameters) activated carbon. The activated carbon matting characteristics can therefore be altered to produce adsorption properties tailored to a particular pollutant. The non-woven production process may be altered to produce a non-woven matting material of almost any design, width and thickness; consequently, an activated carbon fibrous matting material, also of any design, width and thickness, can be produced.

No abstract