The objectives and major tasks of the proposed research were comprised of: (1) starch wastes gasification with syngas (H2 +CO) generation and tested/simulated assessment of the gasification pilot plant and economic estimation; (2) synthesized and characterization of high-surface-area presulfurized activated carbon obtained from starch wastes using chemical activation. The surface area of as-synthesized activated carbon was notably enhanced from 54 to 923 m2/g by chemical activation. In addition, the starch waste gasification was a two-order reaction with an average activation energy of 10.3~18.2 kcal/mol including cold gas efficiency of 73.6% and 1.77 × 107 kcal/h of heat recovery. Moreover, the generation of syngas (H2 + CO>95.5%, dry basis) was also recovered. The Hg adsorption capacity of as-synthesized activated carbon was increased with increasing the surface area and content of sulfur in activated carbon. Since the pore channels of as-synthesized activated carbon may be pluged with sulfur, thiophene, sulfate, sulfone or sulfoxide, the BET surface area was decreased with increasing sulfur content in the pre-sulfurised activated carbon. The postulated mechanisms of the adsorption of HgCl2 and Hg(0) might be chemically and physically adsorbed on the surface of pore channels, respectively. The XANES and EXAFS data showed that the adsorbents possessed Hg(II) species in a higher temperature environment. The main species in adsorbents were HgO, HgCl2, and HgS with the bond distance of 2.10, 2.31, and 2.42 Å and the coordination number of 2, 4, and 4, respectively. The starch wastes wth highly Hg adsorption capacity and cheap would have the particular economic potentials and low-cost advantages in the application of Hg removal.

Starch Wastes, Chemical Activation, Gasification, High-Surface-Area Presulfurized Activated Carbon, Mercury Removal.