Charcoal obtained from cherry stones in different carbonization atmospheres

Abstract

The exploitation of using agro-industrial residues as the cherry stone to produce charcoal and activated carbon is very relevant nowadays due to the high demand of these materials and their environmental advantages.

This work describes the methods to prepare charcoal from cherry stones (CS) using final heating temperature of 600 °C, with or without the application of an equal flow of nitrogen or air. The isothermal time has been of 2 h, an adequate time to study carbonisation by varying the atmosphere. The charcoal obtained has the appropriate characteristics as precursors of activated carbon. Of the three samples prepared in different atmospheres, *N, N∼ and AN, the third is an activated carbon.

It is evidenced that the yield in material carbonaceous is somewhat lower when applying the nitrogen current and approximately 5 % less when applying the air current. For the different samples, in this work we have studied the effects of the atmosphere during the heat treatment of CS, the yield, the chemical composition and the structure, as well as the pore structure of the same.