INVESTIGATION OF THE INFLUENCE OF TECHNOLOGICAL VARIABLES AND MATERIAL PARAMETERS DURING DENSIFICATION OF ACACIA SAWDUST.

During the biomass densification can be recognized various technological variables and also material parameters which significantly influences the final solid biofuels quality. The paper deals with the experimental research of the relationship between technological variables and material parameters during densification of acacia wood sawdust. The main goal of presented experimental research is to determine the relationship between compression pressure, pressing temperature and raw material moisture content and particle size during densification of acacia wood sawdust. Research findings presented in this paper are based on a realized experimental research which was done on Faculty of Mechanical Engineering STU in Bratislava. This experimental research was a logical result of and based on authors practical experience and wide theoretical analyses of selected variables influence. Described experimental research was realized by single-axis densification. This paper describes also the design of experiment (DOE) and evaluation methodology for this experimental plan in order to determine the influence of technological variables and material parameters on a final biofuels density which mainly represents the biofuels quality. This contribution discusses the analysis of experimental process, its individual steps and their subsequent DOE leading to the development of a mathematical model that will describe this process. The experimental findings presented here are showing the importance of mentioned variables and parameters during the densification process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]