Thermal degradation of Scenedesmus obliquus for biofuel production

Scenedesmus obliquus is a locally available microalgae in the north-eastern region of India. Pyrolysis of Scenedesmus obliquus has been performed in a fixed-bed vertical reactor, at 350 to 550 °C temperature range with 40 °C/min heating rate. The physicochemical properties of the solid and liquid yields were investigated. The influence of temperature on the amount of product yields was analysed. The highest bio-oil yield of 20.42% and bio-char yield of 58.63% were achieved at 500 °C and 350 °C, respectively. 1 H NMR and FTIR were performed for the bio-oil characterisation. The higher heating value of the bio-oil was found to be highest 32.97 MJ/kg at 550 °C. SEM-EDX, FTIR, and XRD techniques were used for the bio-char analysis and characterisation. The resulted char was found to be porous, amorphous, heterogeneous, and basic in nature. The present work suggests Scenedesmus obliquus as a potential candidate for the production of energy substituting conventional fuel sources.