Performance analysis of a novel biomass-fired grain dryer integrated with thermal storage medium

Abstract

This study aimed to develop an efficient biomass-fired grain dryer for the quality drying of agricultural products especially for the farmers in remote areas where electricity is not available. The dryer mainly consists of a furnace, rectangular chamber, paraffin wax tray, drying chamber, exhaust pipe, and a valve in the exhaust pipe. In this study, performance analysis of a biomass-fired grain dryer has been performed for the paddy drying process. This study has been conducted for the three different cases viz. (i) with no sensible energy storage medium in the rectangular chamber, (ii) with sensible heat storage medium (pebbles) in the chamber, and (iii) with sensible energy storage medium in the chamber when the exhaust valve is closed at the end of biomass burning. In the study, relatively faster drying of the products was observed in the case-III. During the study, 12 kg of paddy was successfully dried from the moisture content of 33% to 13.2% in the case-III. A significant amount of flue gas energy was recovered in the dryer. The temperature in the drying chamber was ranged from 40.8 to 48.2 °C and the thermal efficiency of the dryer was obtained as 10.67%.