[Gasification] Universal tar catalyst

[Thomas Reed]

Dear All:

"Tars" sure are the Achilles Heel of biomass gasification, 
since biomass
is typically >30% volatiles with slow pyrolysis.  Those 
volatiles formed
the basis of the development of organic chemistry from 
1850-1950.  There
are over 50 compounds at greater than 1% in the liquors and 
tars.  Great
for chemistry but bad for gasification.

In the 1980s many people pursued "catalytic tar destruction" 
and we made
tests on a number of catalysts while developing our oxygen 
gasifier at
SERI/NREL.  (Reported in our book "Air-Oxygen Stratified 
Downdraft
Gasification" at woodgas.com).

Dolomite was claimed by many Europeans to be a great and 
cheap catalyst
for tar destruction.  It was the bottom of our list of half 
a dozen
catalysts we tried.  I was very puzzled.  Is European 
Dolomite different
from US?

I haven't heard much about dolomite recently.

Any updates?

TOM REED          BEF