How is plasma gasification different than standard gasification?
Standard gasification technologies operate the reactor in the 700 – 1500 degrees Fahrenheit. range. They do not use any external heat source and rely on the process itself to sustain the reaction. Normal gasifiers are really “partial combustors” and a substantial portion of the carbon is combusted just to support the reaction. Their gasification process produces a fuel gas similar to the gas produced by the plasma process, although it is much dirtier and contains char and tars. The lower temperatures cannot break down all the materials. With standard gasification many materials must be sorted out of the waste stream before the reactor and landfilled or processed in other ways. Because of the low temperature used, the gas that is produced by a standard gasifier has tars that are difficult to remove and other contaminants that must be further cleaned up. Char residue remains that is up to 15% of the weight of the incoming material and must still be landfilled. In addition to these drawba
