Coal

1.0 Treatment of wastes

The coal-fired power plant produce four main types large volume waste material (Speight,
2013b, p. 547):
i.

Fly ash: fine particles of silica glass that are removed from the plant exhaust gases

ii.

by air emission control devices.

Bottom ash: ash particles that are too large to be carried in the flue gases and

iii.

collect on the furnace walls or fall through open grates to an ash hopper.
Boiler slag: molten bottom ash collected at the base of slag tap and cyclone type
furnaces that is quenched with water and consists of hard, black, angular particles

iv.

that have a smooth, glassy appearance.

Flue gas: desulfurization materials such as gypsum: sludge or powdered sulfate
and sulfite produced through a process used to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions
from the exhaust gas system of a coal-fired boiler.

There method to treat those waste (Speight, 2013b, p. 548):

i.

Removing the pollutant from the process effluent by passing polluted air through a

ii.
iii.

series of dust collectors that filter the fine particulates.

Removing the pollutant from the process input by desulfurization of the feed coal.
Controlling the process by lowering combustion temperature to minimize the

iv.

generation of nitrogen oxides.

Replacing the process with one that does not generate or will minimize the
pollutant, e.g., pressurized fluidized bed combustion instead of pulverized coal
burning.