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COAL UTILISATION
and
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Table of Contents
Section Page
Introduction 3
Power Generation 6
References 30
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Introduction
Power generation
Steel making
Cement production
Industrial uses
Coal quality
Economics of use
Coals are often classified as good quality and poor quality primarily based on
energy, moisture or coking properties.
Consider that if the coal quality suits the end use then the coal is a good
quality coal.
We will focus on power generation and clean coal technologies in this section.
The vast majority of Indonesian coal is used in the power generation industry.
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Coal Rank
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Metallurgical coals
Coals that have what are known as coking properties. When heated in a coke
oven produce a strong porous solid residue (coke).
Steaming coals
Coals that are used as feed in the production of gaseous and/or liquid
products derived from coal.
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Power Generation
Introduction
There has been a steady increase in demand for steaming coal over the last
30 years. The demand rising mostly from increase in number of coal fired
power stations.
Coal is the preferred fossil fuel for power generation. The main factors in
choice of coal are the cost of heat content and suitability for boiler. This
depends on mining, processing and transport costs and the characteristics of
the coal.
Newer types of boilers can fire a wider range of coal qualities. When
designing the boiler and plant the coal types that will be used are subjected to
pilot combustion tests to obtain performance data.
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Carbon, the major component of coal, is the principal source of energy. About
14 500 Btu/lb or 8055 kcal/kg of energy liberated for carbon.
Hydrogen generates about 62 000 Btu/lb or 34 444 kcal/kg but not all of this
energy is available for heat as part of the hydrogen combines with oxygen to
form water vapor.
The higher the oxygen content of coal the lower the heating value. This is
because the oxygen is chemically bound to the carbon in the coal structure.
Thus the carbon is partially oxidised lowering the heating value.
This follows the coal rank – higher rank higher carbon, lower hydrogen and
oxygen and higher heating values.
Bottom Ash
Fly Ash
Sulphur Dioxide SO2
Nitrous Oxides NOx
Water H2O
Carbon Dioxide CO2
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Pulverising
Combustion
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Coal is received from sources that can be imported coals or domestic coals
depending on country. Domestic coals can be mine mouth operations where
the power station is located adjacent to mine.
The stockpiling process depends on plant location, coal source/s and number
of types of coal fired at the plant.
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Pulverising
The most common forms of pulverisers are vertical spindle (ball or roller) units
and horizontal tube (ball) units.
The tube ball mills are generally more expensive, consume more power and
noisier. However the horizontal mill produces a more consistent size product
and requires less maintenance.
The product size from a vertical mill changes with the number of hours used
due to metal wear.
The pulverised coal is conveyed to the burners pneumatically. The air that
transports the coal is called primary air and usually represents 25% of total
combustion air. The air is heated to dry the coal. The air temperature depends
on coal moisture content, usually about 300ºC.
High moisture and pyritic sulphur can affect the pulveriser performance.
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Combustion
The pulverised coal is blown with part of the combustion air into boiler through
a series of burner nozzles. Secondary and tertiary air may also be added.
Two different boiler designs are commonly used. One is the traditional two-
pass layout where there is a furnace chamber, topped by heat transfer tubing.
The flue gases pass through a 180º bend and downwards through the main
heat transfer and economiser sections.
The other design is a tower boiler where the heat transfer sections are
mounted vertically above each other, over the combustion chamber.
The geometry and dimensions of the boiler furnace are related to the
combustion system and fuel to be used. The furnace cross-section must
accommodate the flame shape plus burner arrangements/spacing. The flame
must not impinge on the furnace walls.
The boiler atmosphere has reducing zone (mainly flame area) and oxidizing
(convective areas).
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Removal of bottom ash formed during combustion can be done two ways.
Dry bottom
Wet bottom
The dry bottom furnace is the most common type these days. Wet bottom
furnace can handle larger size coal but the AFT temperatures must be lower
so the ash remains in a molten state.
Low NOx burners are used to minimise the formation of NO x gases. These
burners achieve a cooler flame so combustion is longer under reducing
conditions. NOx formation increases at higher temperatures and excess
combustion air.
Generally the higher the volatile matter content the more stable the
combustion process. To fore low volatile coals (20% daf) special designs must
be used.
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Both slagging and fouling reduce heat transfer efficiency. In severe cases the
boiler may have to be shut down and deposits removed from the surfaces.
The ash content, ash chemistry, chlorine, sulphur, process temperature and
design affect the tendency of a coal to foul or slag.
Table on following page details some of the relationships used to estimate the
potential slagging or fouling factor of a coal.
Note the relationships are estimations and predictive ability varies from coal to
coal.
Recent research shows that a better prediction of coal slagging and fouling is
made from looking at solid, liquid and gaseous phases of the Al-Ca-Mg-Fe-Si
oxides at high and low temperatures. This is done by sophisticated testing
and computer modeling.
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Combustion
Convection
Heat transfer takes place at the combustion zone by radiation from the flame
to water tubes producing saturated steam and to a radiant superheater.
In the convection zone heat is transferred from hot flue gases to superheater
tubes. The temperature of the flue gases must be decreased before
convective transfer. This typically below 1050ºC. This means the radiant heat
transfer surface must be sufficient to achieve temperature drop.
Heat transfer also takes place by convection in the economiser (water heater)
and air heater.
PCC steam turbines range in size from 50 to 1300 MWe. Most are over 300
MWe to take advantages of economies of scale.
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Boiler Efficiency
Factors are:
Coal moisture
Higher hydrogen means loss of heat in flue gas from higher moisture
Boiler design
Higher steam pressure and temperature (up to 30 MPa and 600ºC) means
better heat transfer. Restriction is material failure at higher temperatures.
Research is looking at advanced alloy material for superheater and furnace
wall surfaces.
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