Classification of natural and thermo-modified peat by class-modeling techniques

Significant attention is paid to the production of peat-based materials in modern days. The study explores the influence of natural peat thermal modification on its properties by applying class-modeling techniques. Modification of different types of peat is achieved by heating at 250 ° C. The set of peat properties such as component composition, g-factor and IR-spectra is used to obtain data matrix. It is shown that class-modeling techniques, such as partial least-squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) and simple independent modeling of class analogy (SIMCA), allow estimating peat class (natural or modified) by a set of properties without prediction errors by using three latent variables. According to the results of classification, it is established that thermal modification can be considered as a means of regulating the composition and physico-chemical properties of natural peats as a raw material.