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Abstract

The use of biomass is becoming increasingly important as an alternative energy resource, particularly for developing countries. The conversion of solid biomass to gaseous forms by the use of gasifiers has some prospects for domestic and industrial utilization. Improved cook-stoves based on gasification are considered to be costeffective means of energy supply to households for cooking. In this study, four biomass fuelswood chips, corn cobs, coconut shells and palm kernel shellswere characterized and used to carry out a performance evaluation of an inverted downdraft biomass gasifier cook-stove. The performance evaluation showed that all fuels used were suitable for the operation of the cook-stove with wood chips having the best performance. The efficiency of the stove varied with the fuel used with the maximum efficiency of the cook-stove being 20.76%. The fuel consumption rate of the cook-stove for utilization of the biomass fuels ranged between 1.60 to 1.82 kg/hr. The specific gasification rate also ranged between 85.89 and 102.25 kg/m 2 hr.