Densification of biomass into pyrolysis oil for gasification is gaining increasing interest. The major advantages of this approach include costs reduction for transportation and storage, easier feedstock handling as well as easier feeding of the bio-oil for pressurized gasification system.

In this project, woody biomass from local radiata pine trees is converted into pyrolysis oil where the oil is then sprayed into a high temperature entrained flow gasifier which was recently developed and commissioned at this university. The oil is atomized into fine droplets before going through series of conversion reactions to yield hydrogen and carbon monoxide rich gas product.