Generalised equations of low-temperature pyrolysis for nitrogen removal from wood waste

Abstract With the aim of predicting potential nitrogen removal from waste wood products through pyrolysis, this paper presents development of generalized equations based on rigorous experimental measurements conducted earlier. Integrated parametric equations for three dependent variables related to nitrogen removal were developed based on two contributing factors: reaction time and temperature. Patterns of variations of dependent variables with independent variables were converted to parametric equations, which were eventually amalgamated to single equations having two independent variables. Three equations were developed for three dependent variables representing nitrogen removal; NH 3 release in mg, nitrogen elimination in percent and residual mass of wood in mg. Comparison of the developed equation produced results were assessed against original experimental data. Comparison revealed that the developed equation for NH 3 release is capable to accurately predict potential NH 3 release having a correlation coefficient of 0.99 with the experimental data. Standard statistical errors of the equation projected calculations are, RMSE = 0.13, MAE = 0.11 and RAE = 0.03. For the equations of nitrogen elimination and residual mass the achieved correlation coefficients were 0.94 and 0.97 respectively. Corresponding RMSE, MAE and RAE values are 2.51 & 21.72, 2.07 & 14.88 and 0.04 & 0.06 respectively. Such mathematical framework will be a useful tool for the stakeholders, who need to decide suitable input variables for a target nitrogen removal through the process of pyrolysis for wood waste.