5.2. Calorific value results
The amount of heat energy released by burning a unit mass of
fuel can be determined using an Oxygen bomb calorimeter [19]. The
ambient temperature of the water bath the bomb calorimeter
varied from test to test. Therefore, in order to compare the results
for different fuels, it was decided to “Normalise” these results by
dividing the temperature at any time during each experiment by
their respective starting temperature. Fig. 3 shows normalised
temperature profiles for six biomass samples in the calorimeter
while testing their calorific values. The first 10 min of this test was
used to bring the system to steady state condition, and thereafter,
the fuel is ignited at the 10th minute. Temperature of the water
bath was continuously measured for 40 min. The normalised
temperature raise across time graph is shown in shown in Fig. 3.