Assessing the chemical composition of heavy components in bio-oils from the pyrolysis of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin at slow and fast heating rates

Abstract

The certain challenge for the utilization of bio-oil is to investigate the nature and formation of reactive large molecular (heavy) components (>200 Da) in bio-oil. In order to investigate the chemical composition of the heavy components in the bio-oils from the pyrolysis of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin, the molecular formulas of the heavy compounds and the large aromatic structures were obtained based on the results from the Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometer (FT-ICR MS) and the ultraviolet fluorescence (UV-F) spectrometer. The results indicated that both the oxygen content and yield of the heavy components showed the highest in the cellulose-oil and the lowest in the lignin-oil. The large molecular compounds were formed mainly via the recombination of the O-containing species, which could be changed at different temperatures and heating rates. Large amount of heavy saccharide and phenolic species existed in cellulose-oil and hemicellulose-oil, while almost no saccharide species and little phenolic species were detected in the lignin-oil. The main heavy components in the lignin-oil were lipids rather than the phenolic species. The heavy components in the bio-oil from the biomass should be mainly derived from the pyrolysis of the cellulose individually or the interactions among the three components.