Article | REF: BE8535 V3

Wood for energy : Properties and associated technologies

Authors: Xavier DEGLISE, André DONNOT

Publication date: October 10, 2020, Review date: October 1, 2020

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ABSTRACT

Wood energy is often associated with fuel wood, but this is changing as we increasingly consider it as a way to reduce greenhouse emissions. This change is important because it enhances the use of wood energy, which thus shifts from a purely economic issue linked to the cost of fossil fuels, to a renewable energy source in Europe. Our first part presents the importance of wood as a sustainable resource. The next section presents the key physical and thermal properties of wood. It is followed by the description of chemical reactions involved in the transformation of wood into thermal energy, in gaseous, liquid or solid fuels. In the last part we describe the processes and equipment in the research, development, and mature stages.

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AUTHORS

  • Xavier DEGLISE: Pr Enseignant-chercheur Laboratoire études recherches matériau bois (LERMAB) – (EA 4370 – USC INRA 1445) Université de Lorraine – Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, France

  • André DONNOT: Laboratoire études recherches matériau bois (LERMAB) – (EA 4370 – USC INRA 1445) Université de Lorraine – Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, France

 INTRODUCTION

The use of wood for heating has a long history, and is often reduced to the combustion and manufacture of charcoal. Over the last century, other utilization techniques have emerged, such as gasification. The development of new energy applications for wood is often associated with energy crises, in particular the two oil crises, but today interest is shifting to environmental issues, in particular the depletion of fossil fuel resources and global warming.

Wood energy offers a solution for every problem: charcoal for energy conservation, combustion to maintain thermal comfort, gasification for vehicle propulsion, and so on. At a time when strategic choices are being made for the future, it is important to have an overview of the possibilities offered by wood as an energy source.

In fact, the various wood energy recovery processes are very numerous, and most of them can be implemented with a minimum of effort and financial resources. It's just a shame that the work carried out in the 1980s has not been continued, forcing us to use imported technologies to combat the greenhouse effect.

But let's be realistic: wood is a delocalized raw material that will require reasonably-sized energy recovery processes to produce additional energy.

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