Experimental studies on wood pellets combustion in a fixed bed combustor using Taguchi method
The combustion of wood pellets in a fixed bed combustor of a 20 kW capacity domestic pellet boiler was tested according to several factors including Power, Excess Air (EA), Primary/Secondary air Split Ratio (SR) and Grate Area (GA). The Taguchi method was applied to program the experimental design. Several parameters were measured, including gas emissions (CO), fuel bed temperature (measured at 4 different heights), and efficiency. The experimental results show that the lower CO emission and the higher efficiency were obtained at medium thermal loads and the highest temperature on the fuel bed was obtained at about ¼ of its height (15 mm). The results obtained from the analysis of variance (ANOVA) show that the SR and the Power are the most important factors contributing to the CO reduction and also increase the fuel bed temperature. ; This work has been supported by FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the R&D Units, MEtRICs Project Scope: UIDB/04077/2020; Lelis Fraga was supported through a PhD Grant by Fundo de Desenvolvimento Capital Humano of the Government of Timor ...