Prescribed (i.e., controlled) burning is a common practice used in many vegetation types in the world to accomplish a wide range of land management objectives including wildfire risk reduction, wildlife habitat improvement, forest regeneration, and land clearing. To properly apply controlled fire and reduce unwanted fire behavior, an improved understanding of fundamental processes related to combustion of live and dead vegetation is needed. Since the combustion process starts with pyrolysis, there is a need for more data and better models of pyrolysis of live and dead fuels. In this study, slow pyrolysis experiments were carried out in a pyrolyzer apparatus under nitrogen atmosphere in two groups of experiments. In the first group, the effects of temperature (400–800 °C), a slow heating rate (5–30 °C min⁻¹), and carrier gas flow rate (50–350 ml min⁻¹) on yields of tar and light gas obtained from pyrolysis of dead longleaf pine litter were investigated to find the optimum condition which results in the maximum tar yield. The results showed that the highest tar yield was obtained at a temperature of 500 °C, heating rate of 30 °C min⁻¹, and sweep gas flow rate of 100 ml min⁻¹. In the second group of experiments, 14 plant species (live and dead) native to forests in the southern United States, were heated in the pyrolyzer apparatus at the optimum condition. A gas chromatograph equipped with a mass spectrometer (GC–MS) and a gas chromatograph equipped with a thermal conductivity detector (GC-TCD) were used to study the speciation of tar and light gases, respectively. The results showed that the tar composition is dominated by oxygenated aromatic compounds consisting mainly of phenols. The light gas analysis showed that CO and CO₂ were the dominant light gas species for all plant samples on a dry wt% basis, followed by CH₄ and H₂.

规定（即控制）燃烧是世界上许多植被类型使用的一种普遍做法，用于实现广泛的土地管理目标，包括减少野火风险，改善野生动植物栖息地，森林更新和土地清理。为了适当地施加受控的火灾并减少不必要的火灾行为，需要更好地了解与生，死植被燃烧相关的基本过程。由于燃烧过程从热解开始，因此需要更多的数据和更好的生，死燃料热解模型。在这项研究中，在两组实验中，在氮气氛下，在热解器中进行了缓慢的热解实验。在第一组中，温度的影响（400–800°C），缓慢的升温速率（5–30°C min ^-1），研究载气流速（50-350 ml min ^-1）对焦油和死长叶松木凋落物热解获得的轻质气体产率的影响，以找到导致最大焦油产率的最佳条件。结果表明，在500°C的温度，30°C min ^-1的加热速率和100 ml min ^-1的吹扫气体流速下可获得最高的焦油产率。。在第二组实验中，将美国南部森林的14种植物物种（有生命和有生命的物种）在最佳条件下在热解仪中加热。配备质谱仪（GC-MS）的气相色谱仪和配备热导检测器（GC-TCD）的气相色谱仪分别用于研究焦油和轻质气体的形态。结果表明，焦油组成由主要由酚组成的氧化芳族化合物所控制。轻气分析表明，按干重％计，CO和CO ₂是所有植物样品的主要轻气种类，其次是CH ₄和H ₂。