Steam plasmatron gasification of distillers grains residue from ethanol production

In this study, a plasmatron reactor was used for gasifying the waste of distillers grains at different temperatures (773, 873, 973 K) and water flow rates (1, 2, 3 mL min−1), which were heated to produce steam. Among all the gas products, syngas was the major component (88.5 wt.% or 94.66 vol.%) with temperatures yielding maximum concentrations at 873 K with a relatively high reaction rate. The maximum concentrations regarding gaseous production occurring times are all below 1 min. With the increase of steam, the recovery mass yield of syngas also increases from 34.14 to 45.47 ∼ 54.66 wt.% at 873 K. Water–gas reactions and steam-methane reforming reactions advance the production of syngas with the increase of steam. Furthermore, the water-shift reaction also increases in the context of steam gasification which leads to the decrease of CO2 at the same time.