International Journal of Ambient Energy

ISSN: 0143-0750 (Print) 2162-8246 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/taen20

Experimental investigation on biomass fired dryer

for drying of agricultural products

Rohit Nalawade & N. L. Panwar

To cite this article: Rohit Nalawade & N. L. Panwar (2019): Experimental investigation on biomass
fired dryer for drying of agricultural products, International Journal of Ambient Energy, DOI:
10.1080/01430750.2019.1614990

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/01430750.2019.1614990

Accepted author version posted online: 05

May 2019.
Published online: 17 May 2019.

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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF AMBIENT ENERGY
https://doi.org/10.1080/01430750.2019.1614990

Experimental investigation on biomass fired dryer for drying of agricultural products

Rohit Nalawade and N. L. Panwar
Department of Renewable Energy Engineering, College of Technology and Engineering, Maharana Pratap University of Agriculture and Technology,
Udaipur, Rajasthan, India

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

This study focuses on the development and performance evaluation of a biomass-fired dryer. The system Received 7 March 2019
was designed after considering the needs of small-scale rural entrepreneurs. The designed system con- Accepted 1 May 2019
sisted of the combustion chamber, drying chamber, the passage of flue gases, flue gas chimney, etc. The KEYWORDS
thermal performance of the developed system was tested in terms of moisture removal rate, drying rate, Biomass fired dryer; thermal
thermal efficiency, and heat transfer efficiency. In order to check performance, the dryer was loaded with efficiency; heat transfer
4 kg of Coriander leaves having an initial moisture content of 89.40% (w.b.) were dried to the final moisture efficiency; coriander leaves
content of 9.54% (w.b.) in 7 h of operation, 6 kg of babul wood (Acacia nilotica) was consumed during the
drying process. The average drying chamber temperature was 51.84°C. The thermal and heat transfer effi-
ciency of the dryer was 28.22 and 56%, respectively. The economic parameters reveal that the developed
system is technically viable and economically feasible as the payback period is very low. The net present
worth, benefit-cost ratio and payback period were 3398 US$, 2.68 and 0.38 years, respectively.

1. Introduction
India is among the largest producing countries of agricultural
commodities. The combined production of fruits and vegetables
is likely to cross 377 million tons from the present production of
277 million tons till 2021 (Assocham 2017). Despite huge produc-
tion, national food production is not enough to meet the needs
of the people in the country because of inadequate infrastruc-
ture for storage and traditional preservation methods which are
responsible for huge losses (Sharma, Wadhawan, and Panwar
2015). Post-harvest losses of India’s major agricultural produce
were estimated about 92651 crores based on the 2016 whole-
sale prices in 2016 (MoFPI 2017). The faulty post-harvesting
operations give rise to huge losses. The agricultural products
because of their high moisture content are liable to deteriorate
rapidly causing massive post-harvest losses. The reduction of
post-harvest losses becomes a main concern among farmers and
producers.
Drying is one of the useful methods for increasing the shelf
life of the product. Drying retards many of the moisture-related
deteriorative reactions and prevents the growth and repro-
duction of micro-organisms (Naidu et al. 2016). Proper drying
of the agricultural commodities will reduce these post-harvest
losses to a greater extent (Rathore and Panwar 2010; Panwar,
Kaushik, and Kothari 2012a, 2012b; Panwar 2014a, 2014b; Pan-
war, Rathore, Wadhawan 2015). However, drying is the most
energy consuming post-harvest operation and increases prod-
uct cost. Traditionally, Indian farmers are still practicing with the
open sun, which involves greater losses, slower and uneven dry-
ing. Solar dryers are the most popular among the farmers and
producers but non-efficiency during cloudy days and slower dry-
ing rates impose limitations on their use (Kothari, Panwar, and
Chaudhri 2009). Slow drying can bring about more losses of
the product during storage (De Lucia and Assennato 1994), on
another hand, shorter drying time results in retention of nutri-
ents and superior product quality (Aremu and Akintola 2014). In
modern scenario, to achieve faster drying some large-scale farm-
ers and agro-processing industries using electricity as an energy
source, but these methods have limitations due to the higher
cost of drying equipment and electricity.
Drying requires about 40–50% of the energy out of total
energy required for production and processing of agricultural
products (Bennett et al. 2007). It has also been estimated that
drying accounts for 10–20% of total industrial energy use in
most developed countries (Kemp 2011). The present climato-
logical and economic situation of the country demands an eco-
friendly and cheap source of energy for the drying applications.
Biomass can be a promising way to get energy for drying agricul-
tural commodities. It has been found that biomass is such type
of renewable energy source that brings sustainable economic
growth and development for developing countries (Shahbaz
et al. 2016). Over 90% of households in rural areas and 15% of
households in urban areas use biomass to meet their energy
primary requirements (Sen et al. 2016).
India has a large geographical area under crop cultivation
(180 million ha). Owing to this large area under cultivation, crop
residues generated after harvesting are also higher. It has been
estimated that 686 MT of crop residues were generated in India
every year, out of which 234 MT (34%) is estimated as surplus for
bio-energy production (Hiloidhari, Das, and Baruah 2014).
The present research was formulated to design, develop and
perform a performance evaluation of a biomass-based drying
system. Drying system fuelled with biomass seem to be most
suitable for rural areas where it is a locally available and inexpen-
sive source of energy. Biomass burning is considered a ‘carbon

CONTACT N. L. Panwar nlpanwar@rediffmail.com

© 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 R. NALAWADE AND N. L. PANWAR

neutral process’ because carbon produced during the combus- Table 1. Technical specifications of biomass fired dryer.
tion process is consumed during its production. Combustion system
Combustion chamber 60×60×20 cm
Grate 60×60
2. System description Gap between two rods = 1 cm
Passage for flue gases 5 cm
The developed biomass-fired dryer comprises a combustion Height of grate from ground surface 15 cm
Thickness of insulation 4 cm
chamber, drying air inlets, drying chamber, trays, a passage for Drying system
flue gases, flue gas chimney, drying air outlet chimney etc. Com- Overall dimensions of drying chamber 50×55×75 cm
bustion chamber situated just below the drying chamber facil- Trays 50×50×4 cm
Gap between two trays 10 cm
itates sufficient space for the burning of the relatively larger Gap between first tray and bottom plate 15 cm
size of wood. Drying air inlets placed just below the lowermost Drying air inlet holes 4 nos and 5φ
tray, they are provided with wire mesh end caps to prevent the
entry of rodents. The drying chamber accommodates six trays;
they were made up of steel wire mesh and aluminium angles. around the drying chamber to remove the flue gases and uti-
The frame of drying chamber was made up of MS angles and lize waste heat from flue gases as illustrated in Figure (1a,b). Flue
wrapped around with GI sheet. The gap of 5 cm was provided gas chimney and drying air outlet chimney are concentric and
made up of GI sheet. The technical specifications of the system
are illustrated in Table 1.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Thermal performance
The thermal performance of the developed system was eval-
uated by loading it with 4 kg of coriander leaves (Coriandrum
sativum). Thermal performance of the developed system was
carried out in terms of moisture removal rate, drying rate, ther-
mal efficiency, and heat transfer efficiency (Leon, Kumar, and
Bhattacharya 2002).

3.1.1. Moisture removal curve

Figure 2 reveals the moisture removal rate from the coriander
leaves. It has been observed that the moisture content of the
coriander leaves reduced with time. The coriander leaves were
(a) dried from moisture content 89.40% (w.b.) to 9.54% (w.b.) in 7 h.
The dried coriander leaves maintained their colour.

3.1.2. Drying rate

The drying rate for coriander leaves was found using the differ-
ence in moisture content in a given time interval and expressed
as a kg of water evaporated per kilogram dry matter per hour.
Figure 3 shows that the drying rate during process varies from
2.56 to 0.03 kg of water evaporated per kilogram of dry matter
per hour.

(b)

Figure 1. Schematic of developed biomass fired crop dryer. Figure 2. Variation of moisture content with drying time.

Figure 3. Drying rate vs time.
Figure 3 also shows that the during initial three hours of oper-
ation graph remains steeper, that means during an initial three
hours moisture removal rate was higher. After some initial hours
graph shows the almost perfect horizontal line, it reveals that
drying rate decreases rapidly and remains nearly constant for
remaining drying hours.
3.1.3. Thermal efficiency
The thermal efficiency for the biomass-fired dryer is the ratio of
the amount of energy utilized to evaporate the moisture from
the product to the summation of energy provided by the fuel
and enthalpy of air for combustion of fuel. During the drying pro-
cess, it was observed that 3.53 kg of moisture was removed from
4 kg of coriander leaves to a moisture content of 9.54% within 7 h
of operation. Six kilograms of fuel was burned during the drying
process. The energy input from the fuel was 27 MJ. The thermal
efficiency of drier was therefore calculated to be 28.22%.
3.1.4. Heat transfer efficiency
Heat generated in combustion chamber was transferred to the
drying chamber through all three modes of heat transfer, i.e.
conduction, convection, and radiation. Heat transfer efficiency of
the biomass-fired dryer is the ratio of the amount of heat gained
into the drying chamber to the summation of energy provided
by the fuel and enthalpy of air for combustion of fuel. It was
observed that 15.9 MJ heat was gained into the drying cham-
ber. The heat transfer efficiency of dryer therefore calculated to
be 56%.
3.2. Economic performance of developed dryer
The economics performance of developed biomass fired dryer
was carried out in terms of payback period, net present worth,
benefit-cost ratio, as per procedure suggested by Panwar,
Kothari, and Kaushik (2014c).
The economic feasibility of dryer was carried out in terms of
daily benefits obtained from the system. The capital cost of the
system was 210 US$ (INR 66.55 US$−1 as on April 8, 2016). It has
been assumed that dryer will run for 300 days per year. The daily
cost of 4 kg of coriander leaves and 6 kg of babul wood were
1.2 US$ and 0.45 US$, respectively. The dried product weights
around 0.47 kg which costs about 7.51 US$/kg. Therefore, daily
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF AMBIENT ENERGY 3
earning of 3.53 US$ can be obtained from the dryer. After sub-
tracting daily fuel and raw material cost it was found that net
daily benefit of 1.87 US$ can be obtained from the system. Based
on the daily benefits of the system it was estimated that the
payback period, net present worth and benefit-cost ratio of the
system were 0.38 years, 3398 US$, and 2.68, respectively.
4. Conclusion
The designed biomass-fired dryer was capable of producing
average drying chamber temperature of 51.84°C, which is quite
suitable for drying of coriander leaves. The coriander leaves
can be dried from an initial moisture content of 89.40% (w.b.)
to final moisture content of 9.54% (w.b.). The dryer is capa-
ble of transferring heat without the involvement of any heat
exchanger; this increased the energy efficiency of the system.
The thermal and heat transfer efficiency of the designed dryer
was 28.22% and 56%, respectively this shows the rather effec-
tive use of biomass power for drying applications. It was also
found that dryer is economically feasible and suitable for rural
and small-scale entrepreneurs.
Funding
The authors are grateful to Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Govern-
ment of India for providing financial aid to complete the research project.
ORCID
N. L. Panwar http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3309-2306
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