Advances in Biomass Densification and Its Impact on Cost and Quality

Even though densified products have many advantages in terms of storage, handling, transportation, and conversion performance, existing methods to produce dense biomass pellets are currently not considered due to the prohibitive costs to densify them. At present, new preprocessing technologies are developed to address the cost and quality issues associated with conventional methods. This chapter will focus on the advances achieved by industry and national laboratories in terms of biomass size reduction and densification that have a significant impact on energy consumption, cost, and quality. Also, the unit operations and their impact on conventional and advanced preprocessing unit operations are discussed in this chapter.