Production and Characterization of Rice Husk Chars Obtained under Different Conditions

Abstract

Rice husk was subjected to slow and fast pyrolysis under different reaction conditions, to investigate the effects of several pyrolysis factors on the physicochemical properties of the rice husk chars, including the pyrolysis heating rate, cooling rate and resident time. The results indicated that the char yield did not show great changes during the slow pyrolysis process, while it was gradually decreased along with the resident time during the fast pyrolysis process. With the elevating of the pyrolysis conditions, the carbon content of the chars was increased monotonically, while the oxygen content was decreased. Moreover, the rice husk and its chars greatly differed in their functional groups, resulting from various decompositon, decarbonylation and aromatization reactions during the pyrolysis process.