Conversion of cotton textile waste to clean solid fuel via surfactant-assisted hydrothermal carbonization: Mechanisms and combustion behaviors

The cotton textile was an abundant energy resource while was otherwise treated as waste. In this work, surfactants were used as catalysts in the hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) to transform cotton textile waste (CTW) into clean solid fuel. Furthermore, the conversion mechanisms of hydrothermal products during surfactant-assisted HTC were preliminarily proposed. The results showed that Span 80 and sodium dodecylbenzenesulfonate facilitated the transformation of CTW into bio-oil, while Tween 80 was more conducive to the development of pseudo-lignin, which endowed hydrochars higher energy density and updated the fuel quality and combustion behavior. Therefore, the research presented an effective method to convert CTW to clean solid fuel through the HTC treatment combining with surfactants.