USask researchers develop waste-based biopellets

In Canada, a recent discovery by researchers at the University of Saskatchewan (USask) could help hasten use of cheap and plentiful agricultural waste as the go-to material for producing this environmentally friendly energy source. 

Canada currently exports up to 4 million biopellets to Europe each year, the majority of which are manufactured using forestry byproducts. While some Saskatchewan companies use agricultural waste in animal feed, none are converting this material into biopellets.

The treatment process researchers used, called torrefaction, involves heating the biomass at temperatures between 200 and 300 degrees Celsius in an inert environment (an environment free of oxygen and CO2). Their work was done at the Catalysis and Chemical Reaction Engineering Laboratories (CCREL) in the USask College of Engineering and analyzed at USask’s Saskatchewan Structural Sciences Centre (SSSC), with testing performed using beamlines at the Canadian Light Source (CLS).