The 6th International Conference on Biomass Energy (ICBE2018)

534 / 2018-09-20 21:23:58

Mechanistic Studies for Biomass Pyrolysis

Plenary track > B. Biomass Polygeneration

Lignin is an important and highly complex constituent of biomass composed of aromatic and aliphatic units carrying multiple hydroxy, methoxy, and carboxy groups as well as furan and benzofuran moieties. Consequently, the pyrolytic conversion of lignin to biofuels results in the formation of a large number of compounds, generated via mostly little-known reaction mechanisms.
It is the purpose of our work to apply mechanistic studies of pyrolysis reactions, in particular flash vacuum pyrolysis (FVP) in conjunction with spectroscopic methods (particularly IR spectroscopy under matrix-isolation conditions and on-line mass spectrometry) to investigation and characterize reactive intermediates and gain a more detailed understanding of the the reaction mechanisms.
Examples include the pyrolysis of phenolic compounds leading to the formation of cyclopentadienylidene radicals; the FVP of salicylic acid derivatives, in which three different ketene intermediates are formed; numerous reactions proceeding through fulvenallene intermediates; and the pyrolysis of furan and benzofuran derivatives.
The different types of apparatus and the techniques used in these investigations will be described in detail.1
1 C. Wentrup: Flash Vacuum Pyrolysis – Techniques and Reactions. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2017, 56, 14808–14835. Angew. Chem. 2017, 129, 15002-15031.