Automatic Generation of Detailed Kinetic Models for Complex Chemical Systems
A Dissertation Presented
By
Fariba Seyedzadeh Khanshan
to
The Department of Chemical Engineering
In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
In the field of
Chemical Engineering
Northeastern University Boston, Massachusetts
January 29 2016 Acknowledgements
I would like to thank to my PhD advisor, Professor Richard H. West, for supporting me during this journey. He’s the nicest advisor and one of the smartest people I know. He has been supportive and I’m very grateful for his advice, guidance, patience, and friendship over the past four years. He has provided insightful discussions about my research and I am thankful for having his scientific suggestions. My sincere thanks and appreciation also go to my PhD committee members, Profes- sor Sunho Choi from the Department of Chemical Engineering, and Professors Hamed Metghalchi and Yiannis Levendis from the Department of Mechanical and Industrial En- gineering for their helpful inputs and insightful comments. I would also like to thank Dr. Robert Low, Dr. Clive Giddis, and Dr. Andrew Sharratt, from Mexichem Fluor Ltd, for providing scientific suggestions and discussions during my chlorination modeling research. IwouldliketoshowmyappreciationtoallthepresentmembersoftheCoMoChEng group. I am grateful to Pierre Bhoorasingh and Belinda Slakman who have been my good friends during these four years. I know I will miss your company. IwouldliketoacknowledgealloftheRMGdevelopersandGreengroupmembersatMIT. I’m glad I had this opportunity to work with them. Their comments and discussions al- ways have been a great help to me in RMG development. Iamdeeplythankfultomyparents,brother,andsisterfortheirunconditionallove,care, and encouragement. I love them so much, and I would not have made it this far without them. My father, to whom this dissertation is dedicated to, has been my best friend all my life and I love him dearly and thank him for all his advice and support. I would also like to thank the Department of Chemical Engineering of Northeastern Uni- versity for funding and supporting my research.
i I dedicate this thesis to the memory of my beloved father Yaghoub Seyedzadeh Khanshan I miss you every day and thank you for everything I love you dearly forever
ii Abstract
Detailed chemical kinetic mechanisms represent molecular interactions that occur when chemical bonds are broken and reformed into new chemical compounds. Many natural and industrial processes such as combustion of hydrocarbons, biomass conversion into re- newable fuels, and synthesis of halogenated-hydrocarbon through halogenation reactions, include reaction network with hundred of species and thousands of reactions. Recently, the potential of such processes is leading to rapid industrial expansion and facing some technical drawbacks. Among various tools, detailed kinetic modeling is a reliable way to improve the scientific understanding of such systems and therefore optimize process conditions for desired production plans. Detailed chemical kinetic modeling is sensitive to the system chemistry, and sometimes too complex to model by hand. For example, utilizing predictive theoretical models by hand for biomass thermal conversion, which in- clude a wide variety of heavy cyclic oxygenated molecules, alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, ethers, esters, etc., is tedious. It is preferable to teach our chemistry knowledge to computers, and generate detailed chemical models automatically. To generate comprehensive detailed models, an extensive set of reaction classes, which would define how species can react with each other, should be implemented in mechanism generators. In this thesis, Reaction Mechanism Genera- tor (RMG), an open-source software, has been used to build detailed kinetic models for complex chemical systems. This thesis presents several significant contributions in the area of predictive automatic kinetic mechanism generation for biofuels thermal conversion and reactions of many chlo- rinated hydrocarbons. The first section of this thesis describes significant contributions in detailed kinetic modeling of bio-oil gasification for syngas production using RMG. The major challenge in modeling bio-oil gasification is the presence of a wide range of cyclic
iii oxygenated species and several progress has been made in RMG to improve the automated chemical modeling of this process. RMG-built models were evaluated by comparison to available published data and to improve the understanding of such detailed models, dif- ferent types of analysis such as sensitivity analysis were performed. The second section of this thesis presents a theoretical study of the gas-phase unimolec- ular thermal decomposition of heterocyclic compounds via single step exo and endo ring opening reaction classes. Quantum chemical calculations were performed for a smaller set of reactants belonging to the endo and exo reaction classes and data were used to inspect the ’rate calculation rules’ method. To study the e↵ect of the direct ring open- ing reactions in the automated detailed kinetic model generation, the bio-oil gasification mechanism, from Chapter 1, was updated after updating RMGs kinetic database with these new single step ring opening reaction classes and associated rate rules. The third section of this thesis provides significant contributions toward facilitating the automatic generation of predictive detailed kinetic models for 1,1,2,3- tetrachloropropene (1230xa) production and other hydrocarbon chlorination processes. In order to enable RMG to model chlorinated hydrocarbon conversions, the chlorine (Cl) chemistry has been added into the the Python version of the software. A model has been generated in RMG for 1230xa production with known associated thermodynamic and kinetic parameters. For model evaluation, reaction flux analysis and sensitivity analysis were performed to reveal the important reaction channels in the RMG-built model and several improvements to thermodynamic estimates were discussed. The ability to automatically generate these models for such complex chemical systems demonstrates the predictive capability of detailed chemical modeling. The impact of such models significantly improves the scientific understanding of two industrial chemical processes, bio-oil gasification and chlorination.
iv Contents
1 Developing Detailed Kinetic Models of Syngas Production From Bio-Oil Gasification Using Reaction Mechanism Generator (RMG) 1 1.1 Introduction ...... 1 1.2 Critical Literature Review ...... 3 1.2.1 Bio-oil gasification experiments ...... 3 1.2.1.1 Low temperature bio-oil gasification ...... 4 1.2.1.2 Hightemperaturebio-oilgasification ...... 5 1.2.2 Chemical modeling of bio-oil gasification ...... 7 1.2.2.1 Cellulose kinetic modeling ...... 8 1.2.2.2 Lignin kinetic modeling ...... 9 1.2.2.3 HemicelluloseKineticmodeling ...... 11 1.3 Computational Method ...... 12 1.3.1 ReactionMechanismGenerator ...... 13 1.3.1.1 Molecular Representations ...... 14 1.3.1.2 DataHierarchyinRMG ...... 14 1.3.1.2.1 Thermodynamic Database ...... 15 1.3.1.2.2 Thermochemistry Estimation ...... 16 1.3.1.2.3 Kinetic Database ...... 19 1.3.1.3 Rate-Based Model Enlarger ...... 22 1.3.1.4 Pressure Dependence in RMG ...... 23 1.3.1.5 Output from RMG ...... 24 1.3.2 Cantera ...... 25 1.3.3 Model Verification and Validation ...... 26 1.3.4 Bio-oil gasification modeling ...... 27 1.3.4.1 Bio-oilComposition ...... 27 1.3.4.2 Simulating syngas production ...... 29 1.3.5 Optimization ...... 30 1.4 ResultsandDiscussions ...... 30 1.4.1 Influenceofmodelsize ...... 30 1.4.2 Influence of pressure and pressure-dependent kinetics ...... 32 1.4.3 Comparison with experiments ...... 34 1.4.4 SensitivityAnalysis...... 36 1.4.5 Poor Thermochemistry For Cyclic Molecules ...... 38
v 1.4.6 Missing Pathways in RMG Generated Mechanisms ...... 40 1.5 Summary ...... 42 1.6 Recommendations for future work ...... 45 1.6.1 ImproveRMGthermochemistryestimation ...... 45 1.6.2 Add more reaction families to the RMG database ...... 46 1.6.3 ImprovememorymanagementinRMG ...... 46 1.7 Supporting material ...... 46
2 Rate calculation Rules for Automated Generation of Detailed Kinetic Models for Heterocyclic Compounds 47 2.1 Introduction ...... 47 2.2 Critical literature review ...... 49 2.2.1 Specific reaction classes for acyclic components of biofuels . . . . . 49 2.2.1.1 Unimolecularinitiations ...... 50 2.2.1.2 Bimolecular initiations and H-abstractions ...... 51 2.2.1.3 Radicals decomposition by -scission ...... 52 2.2.1.4 Intramolecular isomerizations ...... 53 2.2.2 Specific reaction classes for cyclic components of biofuels ...... 54 2.2.2.1 Unimolecularinitiations ...... 55 2.2.2.2 Endocyclic and exocyclic ring-opening in cyclic radicals . . 56 2.2.3 Reaction rate calculation for biofuel compounds ...... 57 2.2.3.1 Quantum chemistry ...... 57 2.2.3.2 Statistical mechanics ...... 58 2.2.3.3 Transition State Theory ...... 59 2.2.4 Reaction rate estimation methods ...... 61 2.2.4.1 Linear Free Energy Relationship (LFER) ...... 61 2.2.4.2 Evans-Polanyi correlation ...... 62 2.2.4.3 Reaction Class Transition State Theory (RC-TST) . . . . 62 2.2.4.4 Rate calculation rules ...... 63 2.3 Computational Method ...... 64 2.4 ResultsandDiscussions ...... 67 2.4.1 Case study: E↵ect of new reaction families on Bio-oil gasification . 78 2.5 Summary ...... 80 2.6 Supporting material ...... 81 2.7 Recommendations for future work ...... 82 2.7.1 Expand the e↵ect of the functional groups ...... 82 2.7.2 Add more reaction families with associated data to the RMG database 82
3 Automatic Reaction Mechanism Generation for Producing 1,1,2,3- tetrachloropropane 84 3.1 Introduction ...... 84 3.2 Critical Literature Review ...... 85 3.2.1 Proposed pathways from published patents ...... 86 3.2.2 Thermodynamics of chlorinated hydrocarbons ...... 91
vi 3.2.3 Kineticsofchlorinatedhydrocarbons ...... 93 3.2.3.1 Initiation steps ...... 94 3.2.3.2 Propagation steps ...... 94 3.2.3.3 Termination steps ...... 99 3.3 Computational Method ...... 99 3.3.1 Chlorine (Cl) atom type in RMG ...... 101 3.3.2 Thermodynamics of chlorinated hydrocarbons in RMG ...... 101 3.3.2.1 Species thermochemistry libraries ...... 101 3.3.2.2 Group-based methods ...... 102 3.3.2.3 Quantum chemistry calculation ...... 104 3.3.3 Chlorination reaction families in RMG ...... 105 3.3.4 Kinetics estimation for chlorinated hydrocarbons in RMG . . . . . 106 3.3.4.1 Training Set ...... 106 3.3.4.2 Quantum chemistry ...... 108 3.3.4.3 Rate rules ...... 108 3.3.5 Model evaluation ...... 109 3.4 ResultsandDiscussions ...... 109 3.4.1 Thermodynamics evaluation ...... 111 3.4.2 Reaction flux analysis ...... 114 3.4.3 Sensitivity analysis ...... 116 3.5 Summary ...... 118 3.6 Supporting material ...... 119 3.7 Recommendations for future work ...... 120 3.7.1 Improveaccuracyofkineticsestimates ...... 120 3.7.2 Liquid-phase chlorination modeling ...... 120 3.7.3 Investigating the concerted E2 elimination reaction vs. Sn2 substi- tution ...... 121 3.7.4 Expand 1230xa modeling to fluorination reactions ...... 122
4 References 123
Appendices 134
A The largest mechanism for bio-oil gasification generated in RMG-Java 135
B Transition State Geometries of Heterocyclic Compounds Reactions 136
C RMG-Py generated mechanism for 1230xa 149
vii List of Figures
1.1 Syngas production from bio-oil gasification at di↵erent temperatures, reproduced from Zhang et al. [1]...... 5 1.2 E↵ect of temperature on composition of gas products in bio-oil gasification ex- periment, reproduced from Chhiti [2]...... 6 1.3 Three proposed main pathways for LG thermal decomposition, reproduced from Zhang et al. [3]...... 9 1.4 Model for the lignin -O-4 linkage [4] ...... 9 1.5 Proposed reaction pathways for initial decomposition of PPE from di↵erent stud- ies [4–7] ...... 10 1.6 Proposed thermal decomposition pathways for xylopyranose [8]...... 12 1.7 Molecules are represented as 2-dimensional graphs in RMG ...... 14 1.8 Groups tree structure for H-abstraction family, reproduced from RMG docu- mentation [10]. Indented text and schematics show the used syntax in RMG to represent the parent and children nodes...... 15 1.9 Group additivity approach to estimate isobutylbenzene standard enthalpy of formation and comparison with the NIST reported value...... 17 1.10 On-the-fly Quantum-chemical (QMTP) calculation steps (reproduced from RMG documentation [10]) toward thermochemical properties calculations in RMG. .. 18 1.11 General template and reaction recipe for H-abstraction reaction family in RMG. 20 1.12 Reactants kinetic trees (reproduced from RMG documentation [10]) for H- abstraction reaction and reaction matched template...... 21 1.13 Falling up to the more general parent nodes from the exact match nodes to find data, reproduced from RMG documentation [10]...... 21 1.14 RMG explores paths with high reaction rates and will move them into the model ’core’...... 23 1.15 The Chemkin file showing the list of species, thermochemistry, and reaction information as RMG’s output...... 25 1.16 Steps toward building reliable detailed kinetic models using RMG...... 27 1.17 Work-flow of the reaction mechanism modeling for bio-oil gasification using RMG and Cantera...... 29 1.18 Syngas production varying with incomplete model size from a CSTR with residence time 5 sec...... 31
viii 1.19 Mole fraction of four major gases at exit of a CSTR with residence time 5 seconds at a range of temperatures and pressures, according to kinetic models built by RMG- Java. (a) without pressure-dependence calculations (b) with pressure- dependent reaction networks calculated by modified strong collision approximation. 33 1.20 Distribution between four major gas components as a function of temperature, (a) from experimental work by Zhang et al.[1] at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1000 C, (b) from Chhili et al.[2] at 100 C intervals from 1000 to 1400 C, (c) from Cantera simulations (this work) at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1400 C ..... 34 1.21 Distribution between four major gas components as a function of temperature from high acid model...... 36
1.22 Sensitivity analysis for (a) CO2 at T=700C, (b) CO2 at T=1400C,, (c) CO at T=700C,, (d) CO at T=140C,. See text for model details...... 37
2.1 Calculated bond dissociation energies (in kcal/mol) in ester, ether, and alcohol molecules by Tran et al. [9]...... 50 2.2 Rate of the initiation and radical recombination reaction of butanol in RMG [10]. 51 2.3 General reaction template of H-abstraction reaction family...... 51 2.4 The general template of the -scission reaction and formation of free radical upon this reaction class...... 53 2.5 The general template of intramolecular H and OH migration reaction families and formation of free radical upon these reaction classes...... 54 2.6 Proposed detailed mechanism of (a) ethylene,(b) 1-pentene, and (c) 1-hexene formation by Sirlean et al. [11] from the primary decomposition of the cyclobu- tane, cyclopentane, and cyclohexane and by considering di↵erent conformers of C4, C5, and C6 biradicals, respectively...... 55 2.7 Exo and endo ring-opening reactions for Cyclobutylcarbinyl radical and Cy- clobutyl radical...... 56 2.8 The general template of the exocyclic tautomerization ring-opening reaction fam- ily. The example is shown for the primary ring-opening reaction of xylose, a type of sugar from wood...... 64 2.9 The general template of the endocyclic tautomerization ring-opening reaction family. The example is shown for the endocyclic ring-opening reaction of lev- oglucosan, a derivative of cellulose pyrolysis...... 65 2.10 Hierarchical tree for (a) exocyclic and (b) endocyclic ring-opening reaction families. 66 2.11 High pressure limit rate coe cients within the temperature range of 300-2000 K for exocyclic ring opening test set reactions to investigate the rate calculation rules. (a) results for the five, six, and seven membered carbon rings (b) results for the five, six, and seven membered oxygen rings...... 69 2.13 Rate coe cient of the four, six, and seven membered rings across the C, N, and O heteroatoms in exocyclic test set reaction at T= 1100 K...... 71 2.14 Potential energy diagram for bicyclo-octane isomerization to 3-ethylcyclohexene calculated at the CBS-QB3 level through single step-endo ring-opening vs. two- steps pathway with a diradical intermediate...... 73
ix 2.15 High pressure limit rate coe cients within the temperature range of 300-2000 K for endocyclic ring opening test set reactions to investigate the rate calculation rules. (a) results for the five, six, and seven membered carbon rings (b) results for the five, six, and seven membered oxygen rings...... 75 2.18 Rate coe cient of the four, six, and seven membered rings across the C, N, and O heteroatoms in endocyclic test set reaction at T= 1100 K...... 77 2.19 Distribution between four major gas components as a function of temperature, (a) from experimental work by Zhang et al.[1] at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1000 C, (b) from Chhili et al.[2] at 100 C intervals from 1000 to 1400 C, (c) RMG-built model at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1400 C before updating RMG’s kinetic database (d) after updating RMG’s kinetic database with new reaction families...... 80 2.20 The general template of ene reaction with an example...... 83
3.1 Reaction and products from 1,2,3-trichloropropane liquid phase chlorination in the presence of azobisisobutyronitrile catalyst proposed by Smith [12]...... 87 3.2 1230xa formation reaction channels via 1,1,1,2,3- and 1,1,2,2,3- pentachloropropanes dehydrochlorination and 2,3,3,3-tetrachloropropane isomerization to 1230xa proposed by Smith [12]...... 88 3.3 1230xa formation reaction channels by reacting ethylene with carbon tetrachlo- ride from the work of Woodard [13, 14]...... 89 3.4 1230xa formation reaction channels from 1,2,3 trichloropropane proposed by Mukhopadhyay et al. [15] and Wilson et al. [16]...... 90 3.5 Non-catalytic gas phase reaction channels proposed by Nose et al. [17] for 1230xa formation...... 91 3.6 The correction in the enthalpies of formation for accounting the e↵ect of interac- tion as function of number of chlorine atoms for multichloro alkanes and alkenes, reproduced from [18]...... 93 3.7 Initiation, propagation and termination free radical reaction steps in methyl chloride production via methane chlorination...... 94 3.8 The general template of the H-abstraction reaction via chlorine atom...... 95 3.9 Evans-Polanyi plot for H-abstractions from C1 and C2 chlorinated hydrocarbons by Senkan et al. [19]...... 96 3.10 Comparison of SAR predictions with experimental data fro H-abstraction of chlorinated hydrocarbons by chlorine radical by Senkan et al. [19]...... 97 3.11 The general template of the Cl-abstraction reaction family...... 97 3.12 Obtained correlation by Bryukov et al. [20] between activation energies and enthalpies of reactions for (Cl,H)-abstraction from chlorinated methanes by H atom attacks. ... 98 3.13 Predicted Evans-Polanyi plot by Louis et al. [21] for (H,Cl,F)-abstraction reac- tions via H radical attacks for chlorinated methanes...... 99 3.14 Radical recombination reaction family general reaction template ...... 99 3.15 Main proposed reaction channels to produce 1,1,2,3-tetrachloropropene (1230xa) [12, 14–17] ...... 100
x 3.16 RMG’s thermochemistry database was updated with new chlorinated functional groups. As an example, comparison between the chloroethene thermochemistry estimation via GA approach and NIST reported value shows a good agreement. 103 3.17 Hydrogen Bond Increment (HBI) calculations for chlorinated species...... 104 3.18 More HBI calculation to consider the e↵ect of the chlorine atom on its adjacent C-H bond...... 104 3.19 The general template of the (a) H-abstraction reaction, (b) radical recombination reaction family...... 105 3.20 The general template of the (a) Cl-abstraction reaction, (b) Cl2/HCl addition into the double bond reaction family...... 106 3.21 Batch reactor simulation of 1230xa (product) and 240db (feedstock) concentra- tion profiles from RMG-built model...... 110 3.22 Batch reactor simulation of 1230xa (product) and 240db (feedstock) concentration pro- files from RMG-built model after including HBI corrections for thermochemistry esti- mation of chlorinated radical species...... 114 3.23 Reaction flux analysis result to reveal the important reaction channels in the RMG-built model for 1230xa production...... 115 3.24 The published patent confirms the reaction flux analysis fom RMG-built model for 1230xa production...... 116 3.25 Sensitive reaction channels for 1230xa production in RMG-built model at (a) T=550 C and (b) T=350 C...... 117 3.26 Reaction phath for concerted E2 elimination vs. Sn2 substitution...... 121 3.27 One step closer to understanding the production of fluorocarbons refrigerants from chlo- rinated feedstocks...... 122
xi List of Tables
I Elemental composition and physicochemical properties of Chhiti’s bio-oil (wt.%) [2]...... 5 II Supported quantum chemistry packages and levels of theory in the QMTP, re- produced from RMG documentation [10]...... 18 III Composition of surrogate bio-oil used in modeling...... 28 IV Elemental composition of bio-oil from experiment II (ref [2]) and RMG model . 29 V RMG-built model sizes in core and edge ...... 31 VI Comparison of RMG estimated thermochemistry from both Group Additivity (GA) approach and Quantum Mechanics (QM) calculations of some species to Ranzi’s biomass model [22] and other published literature where available. ... 39 VII Some missed reactions in RMG for bio-oil primary thermal decomposition. ... 41
I Example of -scission reaction’s barrier heights for oxygenated compounds. ... 53 II Arrhenius rate constant parameters for exocyclic ring-opening reactions from CBS-QB3 calculations...... 68 III Arrhenius rate constant parameters for endocyclic ring-opening reactions from CBS-QB3 calculations...... 74
I The results obtained from the reactor outlet for 1230xa production in non cat- alytic gas-phase reaction according to the Nose et al. [17] method...... 91 II Used activation energy (cal/mol) and pre-exponential factor (l/mol.sec) as a training set reactions in RMG from the work of Goldfinger et al. [23] for the H-abstraction reaction by chlorine atom for chlorinated C1 and C2 hydrocarbons.107 III 240db conversion (%) for 1230xa production from Nose et al. [17] patent and RMG-built model...... 111 IV RMG estimated thermodynamics for some chlorinated stable species...... 111 V RMG estimated thermodynamics for some chlorinated radical species...... 112 VI Group Additivity estimates improved when using HBI corrections for chlorinated radical compounds thermochemistry...... 113 VII 240db conversion (%) for 1230xa production from Nose et al. [17] patent and RMG-built models before and after adding HBI corrections...... 114
xii Chapter 1
Developing Detailed Kinetic Models of Syngas Production From Bio-Oil Gasification Using Reaction Mechanism Generator (RMG)
1.1 Introduction
Bio-oil composition is mostly carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Gasification of bio-oil is a desirable process to produce syngas as a renewable resource with no net greenhouse gas emissions. Production of syngas from bio-oil is usually a high pressure and high temperature process. Optimizing the process conditions (temperature, pressure, residence time, etc.) requires an improved understanding of the chemical kinetics of the thermal cracking reactions involved in bio- oil gasification. However, thermal conversion of bio- oil is very sensitive to the fuel chemistry, and sometimes too complex to model by hand, especially for heavy cyclic oxygenated molecules. It is preferable to teach fuel chemistry to computers, and generate detailed chemical models automatically. In this study, Reaction
1 Mechanism Generator (RMG), an open-source software, has been used to build detailed kinetic models for bio-oil gasification. The influence of the operational conditions and RMG parameters on the model gener- ation has been investigated. Also, as the size of the model is important, the performance of RMG-generated models with di↵erent sizes were compared. To provide more realistic simulations of bio-oil gasification, RMG-built kinetic models have been simulated with Cantera in zero-dimensional batch reactor assuming constant volume and adiabatic con- dition, and simulation results are compared with literature. There are some agreements and disagreements between RMG-built models and literature, showing the importance of the detailed chemical modeling for such systems, also revealing the importance of the kinetics and thermodynamics accuracy in detailed chemical model generation. Further, to generate a comprehensive mechanism, it is important to have all reaction classes for bio-oil thermal decomposition, and the major challenge is the presence of wide range of cyclic oxygenated species in the model. In particular, more attention should be paid in looking at specific reaction classes for decomposition of levogucosan, xylopyronase, and lignin that are crucial steps during bio-oil gasification. Three reactions classes for bio-oil gasification that have been missing in RMG’s kinetic database, were investigated. In this thesis chapter, the challenges involved in using RMG to build a comprehen- sive model for bio-oil gasification, and how they may be overcome are introduced. Fur- thermore, several ideas for next work in order to improve RMG for bio-oil gasification modeling are explained. These ideas include some thoughts on updating RMG’s current reaction families and reaction rates, as well as improving thermochemistry estimations particularity for cyclic molecules.
2 1.2 Critical Literature Review
Global warming due to greenhouse gas emissions, increasing energy demands, and de- creasing fossil fuel resources have increased interest in renewable fuels. Bio-oil, a carbon neutral and renewable fuel, results from the fast pyrolysis of biomass in the absence of oxygen. Biomass can be found as forest residue, animal waste, wood chips, and municipal solid waste [24]. The major products of biomass fast pyrolysis under high temperature and pressure are liquid bio-oil, hydrogen, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, light hydro- carbons, and solid bio-char [25, 26]. The major components of bio-oil are organic acids, ketones, furans, levoglucosan, phenolic, and cyclic oxygenate molecules [27–29]. Bio-oil contains di↵erent amounts of these components depending on the initial source of the biomass [30, 31]. Bio-oil can be either used directly as a fuel supply or further converted to syngas. The expense of transporting biomass, a low density, bulky, polluting material, and problems with direct conversion of biomass to syngas, makes processing of biomass to bio-oil, followed by bio-oil high temperature gasification, a suitable alternative [32]. A literature review that discusses published information regarding bio-oil gasification exper- imentally and theoretically, is presented in the current section.
1.2.1 Bio-oil gasification experiments
There is no complete detailed chemical model for bio-oil gasification to date but there are several experimental studies in the bio-oil gasification field. Lotfi et al.[32] investigated syngas production from bio-oil gasification through thermal and catalytic reactions in a pilot plant bubbling fluidized bed at moderate temperature and atmospheric pressure. Catalytic gasification of bio-oils in their micro reactor revealed that a syngas with desired yield can be produced from bio-oil gasification with a suitable catalyst and optimal oper- ating conditions. Van Rossum et al.[33] also studied the bio-oil gasification in a fluidized
3 bed reactor over a wide temperature range (523–914 C) with and without the use of nickel-based catalysts. For both cases, initial activity of syngas (H2 and CO) production had been shown at T > 700 C. Further, Adjaye et al.[34] worked on kinetic modeling of non- catalytic conversion of bio-oil in a fixed-bed reactor. They calculated yields of products as a function of temperature based on their proposed lumped kinetic model from previous biomass studies and they did not provide a complete kinetic model for the process. Two non-catalytic experiments, one at lower temperature and one at higher temper- ature range, were chosen to evaluate RMG-built model for bio-oil gasification, which will be explained in further detail in the following section.
1.2.1.1 Low temperature bio-oil gasification
Zhang et al. [1] investigated the influence of the temperature and N2 flow rate on syngas production in a fixed bed reactor at atmospheric pressure and temperature from 600 Cto
1000 C. Thermochemical conversion of bio-oil leads to partially decomposition to other forms of oxygenated molecules (CmHnOk)andsomepermanentgasesandcoke.The overall bio-oil decomposition can be expressed as: C H O C H O +gases(H , H O, CO , CO, CH ,...)+coke n m k ! x y z 2 2 2 4 They analyzed the gas products using a micro gas chromatograph and because of the high content of the element oxygen in bio-oil, the gasification was carried out in the absence of oxygen. They observed that by increasing temperature the content of CO decreased until
850 C but then increased with increasing temperature. CO2 increased with temperature which they say is mainly because bio-oil contained a large amount of carboxylic acid and carboxylic decomposition is the main source of CO2, although they didn’t mention their primary bio-oil composition or the carboxylic content of the sample. Figure 1.1 shows the four major syngas production at di↵erent temperatures.
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Effect of Temperature in Fixed Bed The properties of gaseous products from bio-oil gasification at 600, 700, 800, 900 and 1000°C are shown in Fig. 6. The syngas mainly contained CO, H2, CO2, CH4, and the C2 fractions in gas phase were a very minor proportion. It can be seen that the content of syngas changed with increasing temperature. With increasing pyrolysis temperature from 800 to 900°C, the content of hydrogen reached a maximum at about 25% (In syngas). But the H2 content decreased as the temperature increased to 1000°C. This result was expected, since it could be seen that bio-oil at high temperature would lead to complete decomposition. Hydrogen reacted with oxygen-containing groups, leading to the formation of water. With increasing temperature, the content of CO decreased, it reached a minimum at 850°C, and then it increased with further increase in temperature. The carbon dioxide increased with increasing temperature. This was mainly because the bio-oil contained a lot of organic carboxylic acids, in which carboxyl decomposition was a main source of CO2. The content of CH4 increased, and at 700°C it reached a maximum, and then decreased with increasing in temperature.
H CH 2 4 40 CO CO 2 35
30
25
20
15 Component of gas product (vol.%) product gas of Component 10 600 700 800 900 1000 Temperature (oC)
Fig. 6.Figure Properties 1.1: of Syngasgas product production from bio-oil from gasification bio-oil at gasification different temperatures at di↵erent tem- peratures, reproduced from Zhang et al. [1]. Yields of the main gaseous products are shown in Table 2. In this table a nitrogen balance method was introduced and used to calculate the absolute gas yield and the Theygasification suggested efficiency. that the It optimumcan be seen temperature that increasing for temperature this process favored in improving a fixed bed the reactor yield of syngas. When the temperature was 600°C, the efficiency of gasification was is 1073about K and 20%. the The higher highest residence gasification time efficiency did not was increase 80% when the temperature syngas yield. was from 600 to 1000°C. However, the evolution of H2 and CO was mainly associated with high grade fuel through biomass, CO2 was not utilizable, and CH4 required reforming to produce 1.2.1.2moreHigh H2 and temperature CO. When considering bio-oil these gasification results with respect to maximum H2 and CO
Chhiti [2]Zhang studied et al. (2010). the influence“Bio-oil pyrolysis/gasification,” of high temperature BioResources on non-catalytic 5(1), 135-146. bio-oil gasification142 process over a wide temperature range from 1200 K to 1700 K in a laboratory scale High Temperature Entrained Flow Reactor (HT-EFR). The objectives were to determine the syngas yield and composition as a function of the temperature. The feedstock used in their experiments was bio-oil produced from a mixture of hardwood (oak, maple, ash) in an industerial-scale fluidized bed reactor. Table I summarized the elemental composition and physicochemical properties of their used bio-oil.
Table I: Elemental composition and physicochemical properties of Chhiti’s bio-oil (wt.%) [2].
CH O NH2O Ash Solids 42.97.150.58 0.1260.057 2.344
They observed that in the operating temperature between 1000 Cand1300 C, bio-oil mostly decomposed to H2, CO, CO2, and CH4. Figure 1.2 shows the mole fraction of the
5 1000°C and 1300°C, bio-oil is mainly decomposed to H2, CO, CO2, CH4 and C2H2. Above
1300°C C2H2 disappears, while CH4 disappears above 1400°C. As the temperature rises, the
fraction of H2 increases monotonically at the expense of carbon monoxide, methane and acetylene. Above 1300°C the hydrogen content remains almost stable. At 1400°C hydrogen gas products from the gasification process in their experiment. mole fraction reaches the maximum value of 64 mol% of the syngas.
Figure 3. Composition of the produced syngas (dry basis and without N2) - effect of Figure 1.2: E↵ect of temperature on composition of gas products in bio-oil gasification experiment,temperature, reproduced at S/F=4.5 from Chhiti [2].
The reactions that may explain the increase of hydrogen with temperature are :
They also The reported steam reforming that H of2 CHincreased4 and C2H2 with into H increasing2 and CO temperature in the (2) experiment, which is due The to twowater reactions: gas shift reaction CO + H2O ↔ CO2 + H2 (3) The water gas shift reaction can also explain the increase of carbon dioxide and the decrease of carbon monoxide between 1000 and 1200°C. Above 1200°C, carbon monoxide slightly 1. The steam reforming of CH4 and C2H2 into H2 and CO increases. This may be explained by steam gasification of the solid carbon residue resulting from the pyrolysis of oil droplets to yield carbon monoxide and hydrogen following the 2. The water gas shift reaction CO + H2O=CO2 +H2 reaction:
C + H2O ↔CO + H2 (4)
They reportedand potentially that following the water the gasBoudouard shift reactionreaction which can would explain explain the the increase slight decrease of carbon of dioxide
CO2: and the decrease of carbon monoxide between 1000 and 1200 C. Above 1200 C, carbon C + CO2 → 2CO (5) monoxide slightly increases. This may be explained by steam gasification of the solid carbon residue. They also concluded that the increase in the reaction temperature results in higher hydrogen concentration and higher bio-oil conversion.
6 1.2.2 Chemical modeling of bio-oil gasification
The e ciency of bio-oil conversion to syngas, through the high temperature and pressure gasification process, is highly dependent on the operation conditions of the process. Op- timization of the process conditions requires an improved understanding of the chemical kinetics of the thermal cracking reactions involved in bio-oil gasification [35]. One of the key di culties in building detailed chemical models for such systems is the complexity and varieties of biomass components. Considering only three major biomass constituents (lignin, cellulose, and hemicellulose) as major components of the bio-oil, is not defin- ing the system composition well enough. Each of these constituents are macropolymers with ill-defined components and the composition may vary from di↵erent biomass sources. Furthermore, each component of biomass is pyrolyzed at di↵erent rates by di↵erent mech- anisms and reaction pathways [2] which makes building detailed kinetic models for such systems even more challenging. To date, most of the proposed models for biomass ther- mal decomposition are in gas phase and the three major constituents are used as a model components [22, 36, 37]. For example, Ranzi et al. [22, 38, 39] built a detailed kinetic model for biomass pyrolysis and validated their model against existing experimental data. In their modeling work, they characterized biomass in terms of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin with elemental composition of C, H, and O. They also defined lumped chemi- cal reactions for decomposition of each major component of the biomass with associated reaction rate and stoichiometry parameters. The overall biomass model includes the com- bination of all lumped chemical reactions of each biomass reference component. In this section of thesis, a brief literature review of proposed kinetic models for biomass major components is provided. Later in Section 1.4.6, these models and proposed pathways were compared with RMG-built models for bio-oil gasification.
7 1.2.2.1 Cellulose kinetic modeling
Cellulose is one of the main components of biomass. During biomass thermal conversion, cellulose decomposed to levoglucosan (LG) with the yield varying from 20 to 60% [3, 40], depending on the initial source of the biomass. Levoglucosan can be used as the final product or an intermediate to decompose to lower-molecular-weight (LMW) products. Kawamoto et al. [41, 42] investigated the cellulose decomposition reaction mechanism and observed that the levoglucosan (LG) is the primary product of the cellulose decom- position and LMW products form later. Banyasz et al. [43, 44] proposed that cellulose can decompose to either levoglucosan (tar) or hydroxyacetaldehyde, formaldehyde, and CO via LMW intermediates. In their proposed kinetic model, they calculated the ac- tivation energy of the levoglucosan and formaldehyde as 151 kJ/mol and 196 kJ/mol , respectively. Zhang et al.[45] studied the mechanism for levoglucosan (LG) formation and proposed an energy barrier of 93 kJ/mol. They concluded that from woody biomass resources, the LG is one of the main components of tar and bio-oil [46, 47]. Furthermore, they performed density functional theory (DFT) calculations to propose a detailed chem- ical reaction mechanism for levoglucosan thermal decomposition. They divided the LG decomposition into three pathways: direct C-C bond breaking, direct C-O bond breaking and LG dehydration. They concluded that the products from direct C-O bond break- ing have a large contribution in the CO and H2Oproduction,themaincomponentsof the syngas. Figure 1.3 illustrates Zhang et al. three main proposed LG decomposition chemical pathways.
8 Figure 1.3: Three proposed main pathways for LG thermal decompo- sition, reproduced from Zhang et al. [3].
In their theoretical study, they concluded that there are two possible pathways for direct C-O bond breaking, one is exothermic and the other one endothermic. Furthermore, the C-C bond breaking pathway is endothermic and the dehydration pathway is the more feasible reaction channel for LG decoposition due to the lower barrier height. They also came to the conclusion that the C-O bond breaking has lower barrier than the C-C bond breaking reactions.
1.2.2.2 Lignin kinetic modeling
Lignin, another main component of biomass, is a valuable natural resource for biofuel processing. Lignin chemical structure is complex and includes a variety of linkages such as -O-4 linkages, demonstrated in Figure 1.4.
Figure 1.4: Model for the lignin -O-4 linkage [4]
The simplest proposed model for the -O-4 linkage lignin is the phenethyl phenyl ether
9 (PPE) [5] and the thermal decomposition of the PPE has been studied by di↵erent research groups. Britt et al. [5–7] conducted both fast and slow pyrolysis techniques such as Flash Vacuum Pyrolysis (FVP) to study PPE primary unimolecular thermal decomposition pathways such as bond scissions and intramolecular rearrangements pathways. Beste et al. [4] used density function theories (DFT) to calculate bond dissociation enthalpies (BDEs) of the O-C and C-C bonds in PPEs that were not experimentally available. They concluded that the primary decomposition pathways for PPEs are mostly C-O bond breakage and to some extent C-C bond breaking reactions. The reaction rate for both C- O and C-C bond pathways depends on the BDE energies and are sensitive to the location of the substituents. In their theoretical investigation, they showed that the C-O BDE in PPE is 7.6 kcal/mol lower than the C-C BDE that confirms the lower percentage of the products from C-C bond breaking experimentally. Four main primary decomposition pathways for PPE were proposed, summarized in Figure 1.5.
Reaction 1:
Reaction 2:
Reaction 3:
Reaction 4:
Figure 1.5: Proposed reaction pathways for initial decomposition of PPE from di↵erent studies [4–7]
Jarvis et al. [48] conducted an experimental investigation of the pyrolysis of PPE in ahyperthermalnozzleinthetemperaturerangeof300to1350 Ctoobserveproductsfor reactions 1–4. They detected both radical and stable species such as phenoxy radical, cyclopentadienyl radical, benzyl radical, styrene, and benzene which are the products of the direct C-O and C-C bond breaking reactions (reactions 1 and 2). Furthermore, detection of phenol and styrene species in their experiments, suggested pyrolysis through
10 the concerted reactions (reactions 3 and 4). They also performed quantum chemistry calculations to support the experimental observations. They concluded that the C-O bond breaking reaction (reaction 1) is significant at high temperatures (>1000 C), whereas the concerted reactions 3 and 4 are significant at lower temperatures. They had a similar observation as previous studies regarding the minor influence of the C-C bond breakage at both low and high temperature ranges.
1.2.2.3 Hemicellulose Kinetic modeling
Hemicellulose is a heteropolysaccharide constitute of monosaccharide such as xylose, glu- cose, mannose, galactose, and arabinose [49] and the type and structure of the hemicellu- lose depends on biomass sources. Bio-oil, syngas, and coke are the main products of the hemicellulose pyrolysis . Hemicellulose thermal decomposition was the subject of many experimental [50–52] and theoretical [8, 53] studies over the past decades. For example, Shen et al. [52] conducted sets of experiments with TGAFTIR (thermo- gravimetric anal- ysis coupled to Fourier transform infrared spectrometer) and PyGCFTIR (pyrolysisgas chromatograph Fourier transform infrared spectrometer) to investigate the influence of the temperature on the yields of the main gaseous products, CO, CO2, CH4,andH2 of the hemicellulose pyrolysis. They concluded that the yield of CO is increased at higher temperature, while the yield of CO2 was decreased. They also proposed that the feasible pathways for formation of the bio-oil and gaseous products from hemicellulose pyrolysis, were due to the xylan, O-acetylxylan, and 4-O-methylglucuronic acid primary decompo- sition and other secondary reactions of the fragments. Huang et al. [8] applied density functional theory methods to identify the main chemical pathways for the formation of key products during xylose pyrolysis, as the most relevant constituent of the hemicellu- lose. They proposed five main primary xylose decomposition pathways with the calculated kinetic parameters, illustrated in Figure 1.6.
11 Ring-opening tautomerization reaction:
Reaction 1:
Reaction 2:
Reaction 3,4:
Reaction 5:
Figure 1.6: Proposed thermal decomposition pathways for xylopyra- nose [8].
The first decomposition pathway is ring-opening reaction through the tautomerization with an energy barrier of 170.4 kJ/mol. In this primary ring-opening reaction C-O bond is breaking, double bond is forming and hydrogen is transferring all at once as a single step elementary reaction. The acylic molecule, can go through the further pyrolytic reactions and form other small molecules (reactions 1-5). Huang et al. [8] based on their DFT calculations for both kinetics and thermodynamics, concluded that reaction pathways (2) and (5) are the major reaction channels in the xylopyranose pyrolysis which was in agreement the observed experimental results.
1.3 Computational Method
As already mentioned, Bio-oil is a mixture of hundreds of chemicals derived from fast pyrolysis of biomass. Production of syngas from bio-oil is usually a high pressure and high temperature process and optimizing the process conditions (temperature, pressure, residence time, etc.) requires an improved understanding of the chemical kinetics of the thermal cracking reactions involved in bio-oil gasification. In this study, detailed ki-
12 netic models for bio-oil gasification were generated using Reaction Mechanism Generator (RMG), an open source software tool that can build detailed kinetic models for hydrocar- bon pyrolysis and combustion. Starting with a surrogate bio- oil consisting of ten known species, and reaction conditions (temperature, pressure, reaction time) from the literature, RMG builds a detailed kinetic model consisting of thousands of elementary reactions and hundreds of intermediate species. In this section, an introduction to RMG, Cantera, an open source software package for modeling chemical kinetics models, and steps for bio-oil gasification model generation using RMG are provided.
1.3.1 Reaction Mechanism Generator
Since manually calculating the thousands of parameters in an extensive detailed kinetic model is e↵ortful and error-prone, it is preferable to use computers instead. In recent years, several computational algorithms to build large kinetic models have been developed [54, 55]. RMG, Reaction Mechanism Generator, is an open-source automatic reaction mechanism generator for building large kinetics models [56]. Like other reaction network generators, RMG has to store chemical species in memory and identify duplicates, create reactions and new species in the network, and estimate the thermochemistry of each species and the rate coe cient of each reaction. There are currently two versions of the RMG software: the original, which is mostly written in Java with some Fortran, RMG- Java [57], and a more recently developed version in Python, RMG-Py [10]. In this work, we used both RMG-Java and RMG-Py versions to build models with similar specifications for bio-oil gasification. The version of RMG-Java used was a pre-release of version 4.0, and the RMG-Py was an early beta pre-release version.
13 1.3.1.1 Molecular Representations
In RMG, molecules represent as graphs [58], with atoms as nodes and bonds as edges connecting the nodes, demonstrated in Figure 1.7; standard graph-theory methods use to identify equivalent graphs and ensure uniqueness.
Type of bonds Charge Lone pair electrons Unpaired electrons Element Atom index
3 5 1 C u0 p0 c0 {2,D} {3,S} {4,S} H 1 2 H 2 C u0 p0 c0 {1,D} {5,S} {6,S} C C 3 H u0 p0 c0 {1,S} 4 H u0 p0 c0 {1,S} H H 5 H u0 p0 c0 {2,S} 4 6 6 H u0 p0 c0 {2,S}
Figure 1.7: Molecules are represented as 2-dimensional graphs in RMG
1.3.1.2 Data Hierarchy in RMG
Groups are the most important part in all RMG’s databases. Generally, groups describe the structures around the reaction atoms. Data that are needed to compute both thermo- dynamic and kinetic parameters are associated with groups. In order to use estimation approaches during mechanism generation, a robust and reliable method for rapidly iden- tifying which group values should be used for any given molecule, is required. RMG’s thermodynamics and kinetics databases are stored all the group definitions and the cor- responding group values in a hierarchical tree structure. The root nodes in the tree are more general groups and children nodes, descending from the root nodes, are the most specific groups. For example, Figure 1.8 demonstrates the trees of the H-abstraction with the specified parent and children nodes for the given family.
14 H-abstraction reaction: X_H + Y_rad X_rad + Y_H
Figure 1.8: Groups tree structure for H-abstraction family, reproduced from RMG documentation [10]. Indented text and schematics show the used syntax in RMG to represent the parent and children nodes.
In the following section a brief introduction to RMG’s thermodynamics and kinetics databases is provided.
1.3.1.2.1 Thermodynamic Database RMG’s thermodynamics database reports three thermochemical quantities: 1) standard heat capacity data Cp(T )asafunction of temperature T, 2) standard enthalpy of formation f (H)(298K)and3)standarden- tropy S(298K)at298K.RMG’sthermodynamicsdatabasehastwomainfolders:
Species thermochemistry libraries: In this folder the species with known thermo- • chemistry parameters are stored, the value of the thermo properties are from either available experimental data or high-level quantum chemistry calculations.
Species thermochemistry groups: In this folder species group additive values, ring • strain corrections, Hydrogen Bond Increments (HBI), and non-nearest neighbor in- teractions groups are stored in a hierarchical tree fashion.
– Group additive values (GAV): In this file the the group additivity values for di↵erent functional groups are stored in a hierarchical tree.
15 – Ring Strain Corrections (RSC): RMG separates monocyclic and polycyclic ring correction databases.Monocyclic RSCs are used for molecules that contain one single ring; for a molecule with two or more fused rings RMG uses a polycyclic ring strain correction.
– Hydrogen Bond Increments (HBI): RMG has the HBI groups to consider the influence of the loss of a hydrogen atom on enthalpy of formation, entropy and heat capacity of the radical species.
– Non-nearest neighbor interactions: RMG also has a database with NNIs be- side the group additivity values, to consider the interactions between atoms separated by at least 2 atoms, such as alkane 1,4-gauche, alkane 1,5, alkene 1,4-gauche, alkene single and double cis, ene-yne cis, and ortho interactions.
1.3.1.2.2 Thermochemistry Estimation RMG estimates the thermochemistry of species via three ways:
1. Species thermochemistry libraries: these databases include thermochemical param- eters of the species. Data in these libraries come from either published experimental values or high-level quantum chemistry calculations. When RMG looks for the ther- mochemistry of a specie, values in these libraries always have the highest priority for themo estimations in RMG.
2. Group contribution methods: RMG uses libraries of known values wherever possible to find thermochemical data for species, but usually the data are unknown and it estimates parameters. Thermochemistry data more commonly are estimated based on Benson’s group additivity method [59]. In this method, the molecule breaks down to functional groups and the total thermochemistry property of the molecule will be the summation of the contribution of each functional group. Figure 1.9 shows an example of standard enthalpy of formation estimation for isobutylbenzene
16 using group additivity approach. The comparison between the enthalpy of forma- tion from group additivity approach and NIST reported value for isobutylbenzene, demonstrates that the group additivity is a reliable method to estimate the ther- modynamics when functional groups are adequate.
NIST value: ΔfH°= -5.138 kcal/mol
Figure 1.9: Group additivity approach to estimate isobutylbenzene standard enthalpy of formation and comparison with the NIST reported value.
3. On-the-fly Quantum-chemical calculation of Thermochemical Properties: Quantum mechanical calculations are recommended to improve the thermochemistry estimates of molecules that are not available in one of the species thermochemistry databases, and also cannot be estimated with good accuracy using the group additivity method such as cyclic and oxygenated species. Quantum mechanics uses a variety of math- ematical transformation and approximation techniques to find molecular geome- tries, vibrational frequencies, and bond energies to compute the thermochemical properties accurately enough. The QMTP interface steps toward thermodynamics estimation are illustrated in the Figure 1.10.
17 Figure 1.10: On-the-fly Quantum-chemical (QMTP) calculation steps (reproduced from RMG documentation [10]) toward thermochemical properties calculations in RMG.
First the molecular connectivity structure of the molecule is converted into a 3-D representation using a distance geometry method, followed by a optimization using the UFF force field in RDKit [60]. Next, an input file containing the 3D atomic geometries along with a number of keywords will be generated. The generated input file will be sent to a computational chemistry package, either OpenMopac [61] or Gaussian [62], that calculates the thermochemistry of the given molecule on-the-fly. The keywords specify the type of calculation, and the level-of-theory. In the end the calculated thermochemistry data will be sent back to RMG. Table II demonstrates the computational chemistry packages and levels of theory that are currently available in the QMTP.
Table II: Supported quantum chemistry packages and levels of theory in the QMTP, reproduced from RMG documentation [10].
QM Package Supported Levels of Theory OpenMopac semi-empirical (PM3, PM6, PM7) Gaussian03 semi-empirical (PM3) MM4 molecular mechanics (MM4)
18 Although using QMTP method reduces the errors for thermodynamics estimation of some species, they are more expensive than the GA method in terms of memory and computation cost. In cases of memory limitations or failures occurring for the QM methods, RMG falls back to the group additivity approach.
1.3.1.2.3 Kinetic Database
The key step in generating a reliable chemical mechanism, is being able to accu- rately estimate Arrhenius rate parameters. For each reversible elementary reaction A+B C+D,bothforwardandreversereactionratesshouldbespecifiedinthe ! mechanism. The forward reaction rate (kf (T )) can be expressed as pressure independent modified Arrhenius rate equation:
E k (T )=AT n exp( a )(1.1) f RT
Where A is the pre-exponential factor, T is the temperature, Ea is the activation energy, and R is the universal gas constant. The reverse reaction rate (kr(T )), can be calculated from reaction’s equilibrium constant (Keq(T ))from thermodynamic properties:
kf (T ) (G) Keq(T )= =exp( )(1.2) kr(T ) RT (G)= (H) T (S)(1.3)
Where (G)istheGibbsfreeenergyandhasarelationshipwithenthalpyandentropy of formation of the species. RMG’s kinetics database has the following main folders to estimate the reaction kinetic parameters from multiple ways:
19 Libraries: kinetic libraries contain kinetic parameters for specific reactions that are • extracted from published literature or high-level quantum chemistry calculations. RMG always pick kinetics from libraries over other methods. In case of availability of data for a single reaction in multiple libraries, the priority of the data depends on how libraries are listed.
Families: RMG uses reaction families to generate all the possible reactions that a • species can undergo in the presence of the other species in the chemical mechanism; every reaction family represents a particular type of elementary chemical reaction, such as bond-breaking, or radical addition to a double bond. Each reaction family has a recipe for mutating the graph, and a library of rate expressions for di↵erent reacting sites [63, 64]. As an example, general reaction template and recipe of the H-abstraction reaction family is illustrated in Figure 1.11.
H-abstraction reaction template: *2 *2 *1 H *3. *1. H *3 R1 + R2 R1 + R2
H-abstraction reaction recipe: Break bond {*1, S, *2} Form bond {*2, S, *3} Gain radical {*1, 1} Lose radical {*3, 1}
Figure 1.11: General template and reaction recipe for H-abstraction reaction family in RMG.
So far, there are 45 reaction families in RMG’s kinetic database. When RMG generates a reaction, for example the following H-abstraction illustrated in Figure 1.12, first the reacting atom will be specified based on the reaction template. Next, RMG will search within the corresponding reaction family, in this case H-abstraction reaction family, to find the groups that mach the reaction.
20 C_sec O_pri_rad C_pri C_pri
Figure 1.12: Reactants kinetic trees (reproduced from RMG documen- tation [10]) for H-abstraction reaction and reaction matched template.
Desired templates for the example reaction are C-sec and O-pri-rad. After finding the matched groups, the algorithm will search for data and rate parameters in the database for the template. If there are no data available for the C-sec and O-pri-rad templates in the database, RMG using rules will fall up to more general nodes, Cs-H and O-rad, demonstrated in Figure 1.13:
Figure 1.13: Falling up to the more general parent nodes from the exact match nodes to find data, reproduced from RMG documentation [10].
If there are still no kinetic data in the Cs-H and O-rad in the database, the entire set of children for Cs-H and O-rad will be checked. For this example, this set would include every combination of C-pri, C-sec, C-ter with O-pri-rad, O-sec-rad. If any these templates have kinetics, an average of their parameters will be returned as an estimated rate parameters for the mentioned reaction.
The training set and rules: both contain trusted kinetics that are used to fill in • templates in a family.
21 – The training set contains kinetics for specific reactions, which are then matched to a template.
– A similar group contributions method is used to estimate the rate coe cients for the reactions: functional groups are identified using graph matching and the rates are estimated from a database of rules [55]. The kinetic rules contain kinetic parameters that do not necessarily correspond to a specific reaction, but have been generalized for a template.
When determining the kinetics for a reaction, a match for the template is searched for in the kinetic database. The three cases in order of decreasing reliability are:
1. Reaction match from training set. he reaction match from training set is accurate within the documented uncer- tainty for that reaction.
2. Node template exact match using either training set or rules. A template exact match is usually accurate within about one order of magni- tude.
3. Node template estimate averaged from children nodes. When there are no kinetics available for for the template in either the training set or rules, the kinetics are averaged from the children nodes as an estimate.
1.3.1.3 Rate-Based Model Enlarger
RMG chooses species to include in the model according to reaction flux. It gradually expands a ‘core’ model by adding species from the edge [65], an example is illustrated in Figure 1.14. The core begins with a trusted seed mechanism of small-molecule chemistry and the initial reactant species (in this case 10 components of bio-oil). All reactions between core species are identified and their rates estimated; any new products are added
22 to the edge.
Figure 1.14: RMG explores paths with high reaction rates and will move them into the model ’core’.
User-defined tolerances control the allowed flux (relative to the root-mean-squared flux of reactions in the core) for moving a reaction to the core or keeping the reaction on the edge. There are possibilities in RMG to set additional tolerances for the di↵erential equations solver accuracy and the pruning (deletion) of minor edge species. The core is then expanded iteratively, repeatedly adding the edge species with the largest rate of creation until the user-specified tolerance is reached and the core model is designated complete (for the given tolerance). A tight tolerance (small number) will generate a large model with a long calculation time, whereas with a looser tolerance (larger value) RMG will stop sooner and the final model will be smaller.
1.3.1.4 Pressure Dependence in RMG
Two conditions can cause pressure dependence: low pressures and high temperatures. Most discussions on the subject of pressure dependence focus on unimolecular reactions at low pressures. The collision frequency is directly proportional to the pressure, so as the pressure is decreased, the rate of collisional energy transfer decreases. Eventually the pressure becomes low enough that the rate of chemical reaction becomes faster than
23 the collision rate. RMG is able to calculate pressure-dependent rate constants k(T,P) for unimolecular reaction networks by solving master equation. A unimolecular reaction network is defined as a set of chemically reactive molecular configurations divided into unimolecular isomers and bimolecular reactants or products. Reactants can associate to form an isomer, while such association is neglected for products. These configurations are connected by chemical reactions to form a network; these are referred to as path reactions. The system also consists of an excess of inert gas, representing a thermal bath; this allows for neglecting all collisions other than those between an isomer and the bath gas. An isomer molecule at su ciently high internal energy can be transformed by a number of possible events:
The isomer molecule can collide with any other molecule, resulting in an increase • or decrease in energy
The isomer molecule can isomerize to an adjacent isomer at the same energy •
The isomer molecule can dissociate into any directly connected bimolecular reactant • or product channel
It is this competition between collision and reaction events that gives rise to pressure- dependent kinetics.
1.3.1.5 Output from RMG
RMG’s output, a detailed reaction network with associated thermodynamic and kinetics parameters, is printed out in the ‘Chemkin format‘ and will be saved in a ’Chemkin file’. The information in the Chemkin file is a list of all species in the model with their associated chemical formula and thermochemistry information, standard heat and entropy of formation and heat capacity. Also the file contains a list of reactions with known kinetic parameters. An example of a chemkin file is presented in Figure 1.15.
24 Figure 1.15: The Chemkin file showing the list of species, thermochem- istry, and reaction information as RMG’s output.
Many research groups have been publishing their models in Chemkin format for a long time and this format is readable for further simulations by other chemical packages such as Cantera [66] and Chemkin [67] to solve complex chemical kinetics problems. In this research, Cantera has been used for further simulations of RMG-generated models such as simulations of Plug Flow Reactors (PFR) with known operational conditions.
1.3.2 Cantera
Further simulations to determine the characteristics of biofuel processes in batch, CSTR reactors, and shock tube under di↵erent operating conditions is done using Cantera [66]. Cantera is an open source object-oriented software for modeling chemical kinetics, thermo- dynamics, and transport processes. Furthermore di↵erent classes (objects) are provided in Cantera to represent the phase of matter, interface between phases, time-dependent reactor network and steady one-dimensional reacting flows. Here is some useful objects which are currently used in biofuel simulations:
25 Importing Phase Objects: This object is importing one phase from an input file. In • this study the phase object is the RMG-built gas phase kinetic network.
Chemical Kinetics: This the Cantera’s kinetics manager object and is responsible for • evaluating reaction rates of progress, species production rates, and other quantities pertaining to a reaction mechanism.
Thermodynamic and Transport Properties: This class is responsible to describe the • thermodynamic state of the system.
Zero-Dimensional Reactors Simulation: Cantera is conducting zero- dimentional ki- • netics simulations using this class. The type of fluid the reactor containing should be specified through the associated object. Then this object will be used to com- pute all required thermodynamic properties and species production rates, and must implement the reaction mechanism and equation of state desired for the reactor.
1.3.3 Model Verification and Validation
After model generation, the most important step is the mechanism evaluation. There are several methods toward mechanism evaluation; comparison to available experimental data, reaction flux analysis to determine the dominant reaction channels, and sensitivity analysis to reveal the sensitive parameters to reduce the uncertainty. After the mechanism evaluation, from learned lessons, the model might need to be improved with new data. New data can be provided either from theoretical calculations or from experiments. After updating the RMG’s databases with new data and fixing bugs, RMG will generate a new improved model with the best accessible chemical data. As a summary, Figure 1.16 illustrates model evaluation steps.
26 Figure 1.16: Steps toward building reliable detailed kinetic models using RMG.
1.3.4 Bio-oil gasification modeling
In the present study, RMG was used to build bio-oil gasification models for syngas produc- tion and models were evaluated against Chhiti et al. [2] and Zhang et al. [1] experiments covering the range of temperatures and pressures. Sensitivity analysis was used to iden- tify what information would be most valuable to obtain in order to improve mechanism predictions. Furthermore, the e↵ect of RMG parameters on the model predictions were in- vestigated, as well as the influences of pyrolysis temperature, residence time, and pressure on the syngas yields. Model evaluations showed that RMG missed some reaction families in generating bio-oil gasification mechanisms, and several improvements are needed for thermodynamic and kinetic parameters estimations. Finally, several ideas for future work in order to improve RMG for bio-oil gasification modeling are discussed. These ideas include some thoughts on updating RMG’s current reaction families and rates, as well as improving thermochemistry estimations for some cyclic molecules.
1.3.4.1 Bio-oil Composition
Branca et al. [69] experimentally categorized bio-oil composition into several chemical groups including water (20-30)%, aldehydes (10-20)%, lignin fragments (15-30)%, car-
27 boxylic acid, carbohydrates (5-10)%, and phenols (2-5)% using GC/MS, and quantified the mass fraction of 40 components of bio-oil. Based on these measurements, Zhang et al. [70] modeled bio-oil as the mixture of 10 major components, by keeping the mass fraction of the water the same as the experiment and scaling up the mass fraction of the other nine components in order to account for the neglected components. In the current work, RMG-built kinetic models are started from the Zhang et al. [70] 10-component surrogate bio-oil mixture. The species and their mass fractions are listed as Model 1 in Table III.
Table III: Composition of surrogate bio-oil used in modeling.
Component % by mass Model 1 Model 2 (Normal) (High Acid) Water 21.10 12.0 Hydroxyacetaldehyde 21.77 12.5 Acetic Acid 9.48 19.5 Hydroxypropanone 15.06 8.6 Levoglucosan 17.27 9.9 PropanoicAcid 1.25 29.3 (5H)-furan-2-one 2.37 1.36 Isoeugenol 10.79 6.2 Phenol 0.37 0.21 Syringol 0.54 0.31
However, in order to investigate the e↵ect of a higher initial fraction of carboxylic acids on the final simulation results, another model was generated in RMG with a much higher acid content. The ratios of species were fixed except the amounts of the two car- boxylic acids (acetic acid and propionic acid) were increased so that the overall elemental composition closely matched that given by Chhiti et al.[2] (Table IV). The composition of this “High Acid” Model 2 is also shown in Table III.
28 Table IV: Elemental composition of bio-oil from experiment II (ref [2]) and RMG model
Feedstocks C (wt.%) H (wt.%) O (wt.%) N (wt.%) Experiment I (ref [1]) 49.7 7.4 42.3 0.6 Experiment II (ref [2]) 42.9 7.1 50.6 <0.1 RMG Model 1 (Normal) 37.7 7.8 54.5 No Nitrogen RMG Model 2 (High Acid) 41.4 7.7 50.9 No Nitrogen
1.3.4.2 Simulating syngas production
The Python interface to Cantera 2.0 is used to create simulations of both Plug Flow Reac- tor (PFR) and Continuous Stirred Tank Reactor (CSTR) conditions for bio-oil pyrolysis, with initial mass fractions taken from Table III, and with residence times, temperatures, and pressures either corresponding to experimental data [1], or varied as part of an op- timization study. The mole fractions of the major gases H2, CO, CH4 and CO2 at the end of the simulation were recorded, as these are the parameters reported by Zhang et al. [1]. As a summary, Figure 1.17 demonstrates the complete work-flow of the bio-oil gasification chemical kinetic modeling using RMG to generate the model and Cantera for performing further simulations with corresponding input and output parameters.
Input: Output: Cantera Input: Temperature Reaction mechanism with Temperature Pressure known thermochemistry Pressure Seed mechanism RMG and kinetic parameters in Initial mole fraction Initial mole fraction chemkin format. ⇌ Termination time Inert bath gas Termination time Tolerance Output: • Bio-oil gasification • Syngas mole fraction
Figure 1.17: Work-flow of the reaction mechanism modeling for bio-oil gasification using RMG and Cantera.
Many simulations were performed to investigate the e↵ects of varying temperature, residence time, and pressure; of simulating CSTR versus PFR; of constructing models with or without pressure-dependent reactions; and of the influence of model size from a
29 series of incomplete (interrupted) RMG jobs.
1.3.5 Optimization
The optimization of the bio-oil gasification process involves looking for the optimal tem- perature, pressure, and residence time within given constraints to maximize some objective function. As the pyrolysis of bio-oil is a complex process, there are many possible objec- tive functions. In this work, primarily as proof of concept, we used a very simple objective function to represent syngas yield: the sum of the hydrogen and carbon monoxide mole fractions exiting the reactor. Also, the constraints range for temperature, pressure and time are chosen from experiments. The optimization model is therefore:
Maximize f(T,P,t)=yH + yCO T,P,t 2
subject to 800 K 0.5atm 0.5sec The Constrained Optimization by Linear Approximation (COBYLA) method from the SciPy toolkit [71] was used to solve the optimization, with the objective function being evaluated by Cantera [66]. 1.4 Results and Discussions 1.4.1 Influence of model size To investigate the influence of model size, a large RMG-Java model was interrupted at three stages of its generation, resulting in incomplete models containing 103 species, 202 species, and 307 species in the core. Full model sizes (core and edge) are listed in Table 30 V. Table V: RMG-built model sizes in core and edge Model Coresize Edgesize Species Reactions Species Reactions Model I 103 1,711 10,500 27,725 Model II 202 3,765 19,322 251,781 Model III 307 7,161 22,404 428,714 The PFR and CSTR reactors produced similar results for all three models; the CSTR results are shown here. It can be seen from Figure 1.18 that predicted syngas yield, specially H2 and CO, increases with the model size. The models are quantitatively and qualitatively di↵erent, which shows the importance of having a large kinetic model. 0.5 103 Species 202 Species H 0.4 2 307 Species CO 0.3 0.2 CH4 0.1 Outlet Mole Fraction Fraction Mole Outlet CO2 0 600 800 1000 1200 1400 Temperature (C) Figure 1.18: Syngas production varying with incomplete model size from a CSTR with residence time 5 sec. The RMG models were built on nodes of a linux cluster with 4 or 8 GB of RAM each. As bio-oil contains several large and complex molecules, unfortunately RMG ran out of memory and all the RMG-built models for bio-oil are currently incomplete in both RMG-Java and RMG-Python. Several attempts were made to build a complete model with looser tolerances, between 1 and 5. RMG-Py completed a model with a very 31 high tolerance, 5, and reaction time 0.5 sec. The model core had only 37 species and 186 reactions, missing a lot of important pathways and species. Results from Cantera simulations showed that the completed model with the high tolerance is not useful for predicting syngas formation. 1.4.2 Influence of pressure and pressure-dependent kinetics Figure 1.19 shows that there is an e↵ect of reactor pressure on the predicted mole fractions at the reactor exit. However, for this system (unlike small molecule combus- tion), there doesn’t seem to be much di↵erence between results from models without pressure-dependent calculations and with pressure-dependent reactions calculated by RMG (Figure 1.19). In both models, increasing the pressure will increase the syngas yield. The biggest di↵erence is in H2 and CH4 yield below 3 atm and from 600 to 1400 C. 32 0.5 P= 1 atm H P= 3 atm 2 P= 5 atm 0.4 P= 10 atm 0.3 CO 0.2 Outlet Mole Fraction Fraction Mole Outlet 0.1 CH4 CO2 0 600 800 1000 1200 1400 Temperature (C) (a) 0.5 P=1 atm P=3 atm P=5 atm H2 P=10 atm 0.4 0.3 CO 0.2 Outlet Mole Fraction Fraction Mole Outlet CH4 0.1 CO2 0 600 800 1000 1200 1400 Temperature (C) (b) Figure 1.19: Mole fraction of four major gases at exit of a CSTR with residence time 5 seconds at a range of temperatures and pressures, according to kinetic models built by RMG- Java. (a) without pressure-dependence calculations (b) with pressure-dependent reaction networks calculated by modified strong collision approximation. 33 1.4.3 Comparison with experiments The simulated syngas species concentrations at the reactor outlet were compared with measurements from two bio-oil gasification experimentals described in the literature [1, 2] (Figure 1.20). Although the simulations give actual amounts of these and hundreds of minor species, because the only published data are the relative amounts (fractions sum to 1.0) of the four major gas products (H2, CO, CH4, and CO2)atvarioustemperatures, those are the only data compared. (a) Experiment I (b) Experiment II 1.00 CH4 0.75 H2 0.50 CO Syngas Fraction Syngas 0.25 CO2 0 600 700 800 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 Temperature (C) (c) RMG Low Acid Model 1.00 CH4 0.75 H2 0.50 CO Syngas Fraction Syngas 0.25 CO2 0 600 700 800 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 Temperature (C) Figure 1.20: Distribution between four major gas components as a function of temperature, (a) from experimental work by Zhang et al.[1] at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1000 C, (b) from Chhili et al.[2] at 100 C intervals from 1000 to 1400 C, (c) from Cantera simulations (this work) at 100 C intervals from 600 to 1400 C Besides the discrepancies between the experiments, it is obvious from Figure 1.20 34 that there is a di↵erence in CO2 and CO yields between the experimental and modeling results. Despite this, H2 and CH4 predictions are reasonably compatible with both exper- iments. Also, it is observed that by increasing process temperature the CH4 production is decreased. The thermodynamics of the water-gas shift reaction would lead the ratio of [CO2][H2] to [CO][H2O] at equilibrium to decrease with increasing temperature. The simulation reaches and is limited by the equilibrium position at about 1200 C, but at lower temperatures there is less H2 and CO2 than there would be at equilibrium. Shen et al. [52] have explained that due to the presence of a large number of cyclic oxygenated compounds such as xylan in bio-oil, CO formation is highly a↵ected by ring- opening decomposition reactions of these components and is increasing at higher tem- perature. On the other hand, CO2 is mainly contributed by decarboxylation reactions and is simultaneously decreasing with increasing temperature. Additionally, Zhang et al. discussed that the increase of CO2 concentration with temperature (600 – 1000 C) in their experiment was mainly because the high carboxylic acids content in their bio-oil feedstock (carboxylic acids decomposition was a major source of CO2) but they did not state their feedstock composition, only elemental composition, so the initial amount of carboxylic acids is unknown. To investigate the e↵ect of a higher initial fraction of carboxylic acids on the final simulation results, another model was generated in RMG with a much higher initial acid content (Table IV). Simulation results for syngas production from the RMG-built ”high acid” model, Figure 1.21, shows that an increase in the carboxylic acid content doesn’t make big di↵erences in CO and CO2 levels, but at low temperature the model still underestimates CO2 and overestimates CO compared to Experiment I[1]. 35 RMG High Acid Model 1.00 CH4 0.75 H2 0.50 CO Syngas Fraction Syngas 0.25 CO2 0 600 700 800 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 Temperature (C) Figure 1.21: Distribution between four major gas components as a function of temperature from high acid model. 1.4.4 Sensitivity Analysis A sensitivity analysis was carried out on models to identify the important channels of reactions for carboxylic acid decomposition to CO and CO2 under simulation conditions. The analysis is from the pressure-independent (high pressure limit) model and the small chemistry reactions are from Glarborg seed mechanism [72]. The sensitivity analysis can be explained by consideration of two domains: low temperature and high temperature. At both low (700C) and high (1400C) temperatures the productions of CO and CO2 are most sensitive to the decomposition of acetic and propanoic acids and several radical reactions. The results for both domains are briefly summarized in Figure 1.22. 36 CO2 + CH4 ⇌ Aa C2H2 + OH ⇌ CH2CO + H Ppa + H ⇌ C[CH]C(=O)O + H2 C2H2 + OH ⇌ CO + CH3 Ppa + OH C H O + H O ⇌ 3 5 2 2 Ppa + H ⇌ C[CH]C(=O)O + H2 CH3 + [CH2]C(=O)O ⇌ Ppa H2O + O=C=CH2⇌ Aa CO2 + C2H6 ⇌ Ppa CO2 + C2H6 ⇌ Ppa CH2CH=CHC(=O)O ⇌ Hf2O CO2 + CH4 ⇌ Aa 0.0 -0.393 0.426 -0.252 0. 0 (a) CO2 Sensitivity at T=700 C , P= 1atm and t=4 sec (b) CO2 Sensitivity at T=1400 C , P= 1atm and t=4 sec C2H2 + OH CH2CO + H Ppa + H ⇌ C[CH]C(=O)O + H2 ⇌ C2H2 + OH CO + CH3 Aa + H ⇌ [CH2]C(=O)O+ H2 ⇌ C2H5+ O=COH Ppa CH3CO + HCO ⇌ CH3C(=O)CH=O ⇌ OH + HC CCH2⇌ C2H2 + H2C=O CO + OH ⇌ HOCO C2H2 + C3H4 ⇌ C2H + C3H5 CO2 + C2H6 ⇌ Ppa CO2 + CH4 ⇌ Aa Ppa + OH ⇌ C[CH]C(=O)O + H2O -0.00037 0.0962 -0.378 0.0 0.187 (c) CO Sensitivity at T=700 C , P= 1atm and t=4 sec (d) CO Sensitivity at T=1400 C , P= 1atm and t=4 sec * Ppa: Propanoic acid * Aa: Acetic acid * Hf2O: 5H-furan-2-one Figure 1.22: Sensitivity analysis for (a) CO2 at T=700C, (b) CO2 at T=1400C,, (c) CO at T=700C,, (d) CO at T=140C,. See text for model details. The result of sensitivity analysis showed that free radical reactions are greatly dom- inant at low temperature. Also predicting more methane than CO2 may indicate that the unimolecular decomposition of acetic and propanoic acids are not taking place sig- nificantly at lower temperature, which is in agreement with the observation of Doolan et al. [73] in their kinetics study of acetic and propanoic acids decomposition. However, Frey [74] and Kistiakowsky [75] suggested high amounts of CO at low temperature are significantly coming from ketene decomposition. Decomposition of acetic and propanoic acids to water and ketene are observed in models at both low and high temperature, and these ketene molecules will eventually decompose into the CO and other radicals in the model. 37 1.4.5 Poor Thermochemistry For Cyclic Molecules In the literature there are no reports about complete detailed kinetic model of bio-oil gasification to date but there are several studies of detailed chemical modeling of biomass pyrolysis and gasification as a main source of the bio-oil. Several gas phase detailed chemical models [37, 69, 76–79] were recently developed based on the reactions involved in thermal decomposition of three major constituents of biomass: cellulose, hemicellu- lose, and lignin. Due to the similarity between classes of hydrocarbons in the biomass and bio-oil, bio-oil models were compered with proposed biomass models. One of the proposed models of biomass pyrolysis from Ranzi et al. [22, 80, 81], focused on studying the main kinetic features of biomass pyrolysis in the gas phase and proposed the detailed kinetic model with associated thermochemistry and kinetic data from previous experimen- tal studies and modeling e↵orts. RMG-built models were compared with Ranzi’s biomass mechanism and a few published data for thermochemistry of heterocyclic molecules. Com- parison shows that thermodynamic parameters of some cyclic and oxygenated species from primary decomposition of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin fragments in RMG may not be estimated accurately using the Group Additivity approach; for example, the enthalpy of formation for xylofuranose is around 60 kcal/mol lower from that in reference [22], although it is not clear how the latter was estimated. However, other estimates place it 40 kcal/mol lower still[82], so the range in estimates is remarkably large. Species thermochemistry in RMG can be estimated based on two approaches: group additivity [59] and on-the-fly quantum mechanics (QM) methods [83] using Gaussian or OpenMopac [61]. This automatic QM approach was implemented specifically for cyclic compounds, where group additivity often performs poorly [83]. Switching from group additivity to QM methods for thermochemistry calculations of cyclic species shows signif- icant improvement in species’ thermochemistry. Table VI shows the di↵erences of ther- modynamic data between Ranzi’s biomass model and RMG estimated thermochemistry 38 from both group additivity and QM approaches for some cyclic and oxygenated species. Table VI: Comparison of RMG estimated thermochemistry from both Group Additivity (GA) approach and Quantum Mechanics (QM) calculations of some species to Ranzi’s biomass model [22] and other published literature where available. Species Quantity Ranzi model RMG (GA) RMG (QM) Literature O Hf (kcal/mol) –8.3 4.9 –4.1 –6.6 [84] Furan S (cal/mol/K) 63.9 65.2 64.3 — OH O Hf (kcal/mol) –151.5 –213.7 –226.2 –252.8 [82] HO OH HO S (cal/mol/K) 104.9 117.0 104.1 40.4 [82] Xylofuranose H OH Hf (kcal/mol) –200.9 –212.5 -204.2 –199.7 [85] O OH O OH H S (cal/mol/K) 113.7 58.3 98.3 — Levoglucosan