Biomass briquettes, is substitute for coal and charcoal, and it is mostly made from green waste, and also other organic materials. It is commonly employed in electricity generation, heat production, and majorly as a cooking fuel.

Compression at a great pressure is the way of producing biomass briquettes. The raw materials that goes into the production of briquettes usually are sawdust, rice husk, ground nut shells, bagasse, at times municipal solid waste, agricultural waste, and so forth. Of course, the fact is the composition of biomass briquettes varies with availability of raw materials. The raw materials are compressed, firstly to ensure that the briquettes can burn for a longer duration, and secondly, to squeeze the materials into a smaller mass, which can be easily transported.

Biomass briquettes are a substitute for coal and charcoal. Coal as we know is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock which usually occurs in rock strata in layers, or in veins, and the layers or veins are usually referred to as coal beds or coal seams, respectively. So, as we can understand coal is naturally occurring, and there is a cost involved in its extraction and subsequent transportation to locations where it intends to be put to use.

Charcoal on the other hand is a lightweight, black residue, which mainly is composed of carbon and residual ash, which is obtained by the removal of water and other volatile constituents from usually animal and vegetation substance. Charcoal is produced through a very slow process of pyrolysis – which is heating of wood or other substances in the absence of air.

As one would observe coal and charcoal, though are good forms of fuels, and they definitely have served the purpose they are extracted or prepared for, there is an effort involved, and further it does not favor the environment.

It does not favor the environment in the sense that, coal is extracted through mining, at the cost of ecological damage. On the other hand charcoal, used to be produced, and continues to be produced, at places where there is an abundance of wood, and this production can be traced back to very ancient times. This practice continues.

One can just assess the damage charcoal production can cause to the environment as it involves chopping down of trees. As, one can infer, cutting down trees leads to long term ecological damages and can lead to a large scale ecological disaster, which may be intense enough to wipe out life on earth. We can of course, never forget the fact that the oxygen we breathe comes from trees. Trees need to be protected at any cost.

Biomass briquettes plays a great role in the utilization of agro-wastes including sawdust.

Wood is used extensively for purposes other than the production of charcoal, like for construction of homes, furniture, and so forth. Tons of sawdust remains as waste, and it is often put to fire. This has been the procedure as there was no further use for sawdust, and it could not be hoarded, as it consumes lots of space, and worst still it’s very dusty.

Geetha Biotech’s biomass briquettes has put this otherwise ‘waste’ called sawdust to good use in the production of biomass briquettes. Further, other than sawdust Geetha Biotech has taken a step ahead in ensuring farm wastes, or agro waste, too is put to good use. Thus, the biomass briquettes leaving Geetha Biotech’s factory is definitely eco-friendly, and the product is doing a great good to the environment.

Briquettes, as one would know had seen large scale application only in the developing world, and this is usually to compensate for the non-availability of cooking fuels.

In the recent years, there has been a gradual shift to using of briquettes in the developed world as well. The developed nations are employing biomass briquettes to power industrial boilers, and the boilers are in turn used for the production of electricity from steam. The briquettes are, in such cases, usually employed to cofire coal, to sufficiently raise the temperature to the desired levels.

Biomass briquettes are very different from charcoal and coal, because they do not have too very high concentrations of carbonaceous substances and other added materials.

It has also been observed that when biomass briquettes are compared to fossil fuels like petroleum, the briquettes emit less greenhouse gases, that is, when a net total of gases emitted by both fuels, are taken into consideration.

Likewise, one more very important fact is that, the materials used in biomass briquettes are already a part of the carbon cycle.

There are different ways of producing biomass briquettes, and the main differences rests in the way the biomass briquettes are dried out.

The different techniques biomass manufacturers use are torrefaction, carbonization, and pyrolysis. With a great deal of research, it is of the opinion that torrefaction and carbonization are the best methods of producing good quality briquettes.

Further, the end use that the briquettes are put to, defines which of the methods needs to be employed.

Quality of briquettes greatly depends on the method of compaction. It is observed that certain materials tend to burn with greater efficiency if they are compacted at low pressures, such as corn stover grind. But, then other materials like wheat or barley-straw are observed to be requiring greater amounts of pressure to burn efficiently.

Biomass briquettes manufacturers also use different press technologies. A piston press is employed to produce solid briquettes that can be used in a wide range of applications.

Then there is the screw extrusion which compacts and produces biomass briquettes that are rather loose, and which are used as substitution for coal in co-firing.

A screw extrusion technique results in the creation of briquettes that are shaped toroidal, or which appear like a doughnut. A hole is created in the center of the briquette to increase the surface area, which results in a better combustion rate.

It is believed that the people of Nepal used to use biomass briquettes since a very long time. They often used it as fuel for cooking and to keep themselves warm during extreme weather conditions.

It is established that the very first commercial production of biomass briquettes commenced from the year 1982, and an estimated 900 metric tons of briquettes was produced in the production plant that was established. Numerous factories came up subsequently and in the year 1984, factories were set up with better equipment and a good amount of improvements were made to the machinery that produced the briquettes. These factories produced biomass briquettes using a combination of rice husk and molasses.

The King Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation in partnership with the Institute of Himalayan Conservation has the credit of creating a briquette using a combination of coal and biomass using a uniquely designed rolling machine, in the year 2000.

Japan started production of biomass briquettes in the year 1925 onwards. They are known to have brought in numerous improvements to the way biomass briquettes are produced. They used sawdust to produce their briquettes, and these briquettes were famously known as ‘Ogalite’.

It is between the years 1964 and 1969 that Japan redefined the way biomass briquettes could be produced. The major improvements that they brought in increased production fourfold. They used the screw press and piston press technology to produce the briquettes. More than 830 enterprises are believed to have been in existence producing briquettes during the 1960s.

Not alone did Japan increase their production manifold, they also brought in oodles of quality improvements to their briquettes. Their briquettes surpassed the quality standards of European nations produced briquettes many-fold, and without much delay European countries embraced Japanese technology in biomass briquette making by signing a series of licensing agreements.

The word cofiring is in relation to combustion that involves two differing types of materials. Cofiring is employed to bring down the exceeding emissions of CO2. Though it’s a known fact that the combustion of these two differing materials brings down the energy efficiency, and also adds to the cost, these details are overlooked taking reduced CO2 emission into consideration.

The combination of the materials used in cofiring is such that one of the material emits more CO2, a typical example being a fossil fuel like coal, and the other material, a typical example being a biomass briquette, emits a lesser volume of CO2.

It should not be mistaken that biomass briquettes do not emit CO2; it does. But, the fact that gives cofiring, the edge, is that the materials used in the making of a biomass briquette, is part of the current carbon cycle, whereas the fossil fuel’s combustion emits carbon that remained sequestered for millions of years in the soil. So, the extra carbon being released which is not part of the current carbon cycle adds to the planet’s already never-ending carbon woes.

Boilers from time immemorial have been using coal for combustion. If cofiring could be implemented, carbon emissions can be drastically brought down though at compromised energy efficiency, though this drop will barely be observed.

But, the greater good of decreasing carbon emissions will benefit the environment. Implementing cofiring will require minimal modifications to the existing boiler infrastructure as it’s only the fuels that will have some minor change. But, if the boiler were to be run exclusively on biomass briquettes, then major changes will be needed, and that will call for considerable investments.

Cofiring is thus considered as the most cost-efficient means of using biomass based fuels for combustion. Further, compressed biomass briquettes are easier to transport in comparison to loose biomass. Numerous environmentalists believe that cofiring may be the solution to bringing down greenhouse gas emissions.