Physical characteristic of briquette charcoal derived from carbonization of food waste via microwave technique / Nabihah Azron

Deforestation and landfill recently is the most crucial environmental issue occurs in Malaysia. Illegal harvesting for firewood and improper disposal of food waste at landfill have concern the people and government in this country. An alternative created to transform food waste into beneficial product such as briquette charcoal using microwave pyrolysis technology. This research investigates the potential of solid char from food waste to become briquette charcoal with addition of binder. The main objective in this study is to investigate the effect of different binder and blending ratio on the physical characteristic of briquette charcoal. A number of test have been conducted to achieve this objective which are calorific value test, moisture content, compressive strength and impact resistance. Physical characteristic is important in making quality briquette due to possible damages during processing, handling and transporting the material. Broken pieces of briquette makes the appearance bad and difficult to ignite fire. The result from those investigation shows food waste char indeed has potential in briquette charcoal industry but it must have a binder to ensure the solid char particle stick together. Briquette charcoal with 10% CMC is the most ideal to become a quality briquette due to its suitable calorific value (21.171 MJ/kg), moisture content (6.2312%), compressive strength (0.813 MPa) and impact resistance (99.81%). In conclusion, expanding the research on combustion characteristic will help in determining prospective of briquette charcoal from food waste as a good briquette product.