[Gasification] Wood Gas Properties..

Ken Calvert renertech at xtra.co.nz
Sat Jun 17 16:26:43 CDT 2006 

An Apoligy to Tom  Miles, the outburst below was not from him, it was from 
me.  Don't know how his name got on it, but Sorry Tom.  However,  let me 
have another two cents worth while I am on line.  Woodgas is easy to make, 
but it is a very low btu gas. There is not a great deal of energy per 
volume.  If you used pure oxygen rather than air to make it with, then it 
would be a high btu gas, and maybe worth compressing.  Make it cheap with 
air and only the 20% of oxygen in the air gets todo any good. the  80% 
nitrogen, carbon dioxide, water vapour, inert gases etc.,  just go along for 
the ride. The cost of compressing them is more than the fuel value of the 
other 20% of  Carbon Monoxide and Hydrogen.  The better the quality of the 
wood gas, the more hydrogen it has in it , and hydrogen does not liquify at 
anything near easily achievable conditions.   Thanks for listening, and you 
can read the updated version below again too if you are interested.
 Ken Calvert.
----- Original Message ----- 
[gasification] Safety of Wood Gas.


All this talk about the safety of wood gas!  Whoever is talking about adding
mercaptans has obviously never smelt the stuff.  Clean up as many tars as
you like, but  the smell is still unmistakable!   Stockholm tar!  Wood 
smoke!
Jeyes Fluid! Creasote! Cresilic acid!   You name it! It smells!
   When I was doing my stuff on woodgas before OPEC 2 in the early 80s, I 
was most
upset because the  OSH  (work safety) people  wanted to be assured that the
CO levels were below 50ppm,  thats parts per million!, in our workshops.
When I protested, they told me that it was becauseof the smokers.  Dragging
on a ciggy  or a pipe is about the most inefficient form of combustion you
can get  and half of the light headed buzz that one gets out of tobacco is
carbon monoxide poisening.  .    If you smoke around 10 cigs a day 10% of 
your
blood is permanently tied up as carboxy-haemoglobin.
 If you are a packet a day man its 25%.  The blood will pick up extra CO
immediately, and if you are in it continuously it will build up to a level
proportionate to its concentration in the atmosphere.  But it takes much
much longer to lose it. And an atmosphere with anything over 100ppm for a 
heavy smoker is doing him self no good at all.    I think that it takes 
several days of non
smoking to get back to the oxy rather than the carboxy version.
 It takes about 2 seconds from when you do the 'drawback' on a cigarette 
until the burst of carboxy-haemogloben.hits your brain. I know its that 
quick because I can remember leaning over the open top of a gasifier and 
nearly passing out in those two seconds.  If I had fallen forward rather 
than backward I wouldn't be writing this!
 So, all you  theorists who are wondering what it is like die sooner rather 
than later, go
and buy your self a pack!  I am not pumping for any manufacturer.  Any brand
will do!  And  all the filter tips you like will not alter it one little
bit!   Ken C.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Miles" <tmiles at trmiles.com>
To: "'Kevin Chisholm'" <kchisholm at ca.inter.net>; "'Harmon Seaver'"
<hseaver at gmail.com>; "'Gasification'" <GASIFICATION at listserv.repp.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2006 12:04 PM
Subject: RE: Safety of Wood Gas [Gasification] storing wood gas.


Kevin,

We'll add a Safety section to the REPP gasification site and put up whatever
links to documents people want to offer for safety in design and operation
of gasification systems. (Hazard and operability - HAZAOP - reviews etc.)

Most of the recent work on woodgas safety has been done under the IEA
Gasification Task Force and Gasnet coordinated by Ruedi Bühler, Fritz
Leitner and others. Some of those links are on the Gasification web site.
Harrie Knoef has a chapter on Health, Safety and Environmental Aspects of
Biomass Gasification" in the Hnadbook Biomass Gasification.

REPP Gasification:
http://www.repp.org/discussiongroups/resources/gasification/
HAM Knoef, Handbook Biomass Gasification http://www.gasnet.uk.net/ and
www.btgworld.com
IEA Biomass Gasification
http://www.gastechnology.org/webroot/app/xn/xd.aspx?it=enweb&xd=iea\homepage
.xml
IEA Gasification task force Publications:
http://www.gastechnology.org/webroot/app/xn/xd.aspx?it=enweb&xd=iea/publicat
ions.xml
Gasnet
http://www.gasnet.uk.net/

Tom


-----Original Message-----
From: gasification-bounces at listserv.repp.org
[mailto:gasification-bounces at listserv.repp.org] On Behalf Of Kevin Chisholm
Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2006 7:33 AM
To: Harmon Seaver; Gasification
Subject: Safety of Wood Gas [Gasification] storing wood gas.

Dear List

The issue of Wood Gas Safety is extremely important. Very bluntly, wood gas
is perfectly safe if it is handled properly, and people can die if it is not
handled properly. There is a "right way" and a "wrong way" to handle wood
gas.

The purpose of the Gasification List seems to be to provide a forum to
assist in development of  technology that permits the increased use of
biomass as a result of it being converted to gaseous fuel. It is one thing
to "manufacture" wood gas, but that is only part of the task. It must be
conveyed to the point of use, and it must be handled safely at every step
along the way.

We know fundamentally that wood gas can be handled safely. A hundred years
ago, poisonous and explosive Manufactured Gas, or Coal Gas was produced
centrally and distributed safely to millions of homes. "What Man has done,
Man can do." (See also what Man has done 200 years ago::

In 1801, Phillipe Lebon uses his wood-gas system to light the Hotel
Seignelay in Paris, the first known instance of a whole building lighted
with inflammable gas. See also 1799 Energy.

William Murdock installs coal gas for lighting at the engine house of
Boulton & Watt's plant near Birmingham, England, to celebrate the short
Peace of Amiens between Britain and France. See also 1792 Energy; 1803
Energy.


LPG and Natural Gas are in safe widespread use, even though they are
explosive and a fire hazard. Procedures and standards have been developed to
permit safe and reliable of these hazardous gases. The same thing can be
done with wood gas.

We could start by looking at the practices employed by the Coal Gas Industry
a hundred years ago, and build on their gas handling technology and
experience to deliver wood gas safely to the point of use. In this day and
age, we have hardware and technology that should make such systems much
safer, and at much lower cost. For example, we have CO Detectors that are
very cheap and dependable, and as a first line of defense, they would make
an excellent safety addition to any wood gas system.

Wood gas systems should be seen in perspective. Should charcoal stoves be
banned because they can on occasion put out 2,000 ppm CO? Should kerosene
stoves be banned because they can tip over or explode? Of course not. What
should be done is to improve the devices and use them in a way that is safe
for the user. Similarly with wood gas...

So... If someone wanted to design and build a safe system that used Wood
Gas, where would they go to get guidance on how to do it properly? The
Gasification List should be a good place to start. Possibly the Safety
Section of the Bioenergy List Site could be a Repository for such
guidelines?

Best wishes,

Kevin


----- Original Message -----
From: "Harmon Seaver" <hseaver at gmail.com>
To: "Gasification" <GASIFICATION at listserv.repp.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2006 9:14 AM
Subject: Re: [Gasification] storing wood gas.


> Tharu, I tried to reply to your private message on this subject to me,
> but it didn't go through. Perhaps others here will weigh in on this --
> but I sure don't think it's a good idea to pipe woodgas into a house.
>
>  You need more than ventilation -- people die just standing near to
> a gasifier in the open air if their are leaks. One major problem is
> you cannot smell the gas. Commercial gas systems like in towns add
> something to the gas that smells strong.
>    Natural gas (methane) is not nearly so dangerous, nor is lpg.
> Woodgas is mostly CO.
>
>
>
> -- 
> Harmon Seaver
> _______________________________________________
> Gasification mailing list
> Gasification at listserv.repp.org
> http://listserv.repp.org/mailman/listinfo/gasification
> http://www.repp.org/discussiongroups/resources/gasification

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