Use of the GranuFlow Process in Coal Preparation Plants to Improve Energy Recovery and Reduce Coal Processing Wastes

With the increasing use of screen-bowl centrifuges in today's fine coal cleaning circuits, a significant amount of low-ash, high-Btu coal can be lost during the dewatering step due to the difficulty in capturing coal of this size consist (< 100 mesh or 0.15mm). The GranuFlow{trademark} technology, developed and patented by an in-house research group at DOE-NETL, involves the addition of an emulsified mixture of high-molecular-weight hydrocarbons to a slurry of finesized coal before cleaning and/or mechanical dewatering. The binder selectively agglomerates the coal, but not the clays or other mineral matter. In practice, the binder is applied so as to contact the finest possible size fraction first (for example, froth flotation product) as agglomeration of this fraction produces the best result for a given concentration of binder. Increasing the size consist of the fine-sized coal stream reduces the loss of coal solids to the waste effluent streams from the screen bowl centrifuge circuit. In addition, the agglomerated coal dewaters better and is less dusty. The binder can also serve as a flotation conditioner and may provide freeze protection. The overall objective of the project is to generate all necessary information and data required to commercialize the GranuFlow{trademark} Technology. The technology was evaluated under full-scale operating conditions at three commercial coal preparation plants to determine operating performance and economics. The handling, storage, and combustion properties of the coal produced by this process were compared to untreated coal during a power plant combustion test.