Modeling of Time Varying Slag Flow in Coal Gasifiers

There is considerable interest within government agencies and the energy industries across the globe to further advance the clean and economical conversion of coal into liquid fuels to reduce our dependency on imported oil. To date, advances in these areas have been largely based on experimental work. Although there are some detailed systems level performance models, little work has been done on numerical modeling of the component level processes. If accurate models are developed, then significant R&D time might be saved, new insights into the process might be gained, and some good predictions of process or performance can be made. One such area is the characterization of slag deposition and flow on the gasifier walls. Understanding slag rheology and slag-refractory interactions is critical to design and operation of gasifiers with extended refractory lifetimes and also to better control of operating parameters so that the overall gasifier performance with extended service life can be optimized. In the present work, the literature on slag flow modeling was reviewed and a model similar to Seggiani’s was developed to simulate the time varying slag accumulation and flow on the walls of a Prenflo coal gasifier. This model was further extended and modified to simulatemore » a refractory wall gasifier including heat transfer through the refractory wall with flowing slag in contact with the refractory. The model was used to simulate temperature dependent slag flow using rheology data from our experimental slag testing program. These modeling results as well as experimental validation are presented.« less