Coal slurry
product of coal preparation
Coal slurry is a mixture of solids (mined coal or coal waste) and liquids (water or organic) produced by a coal preparation plant.
Preparation
To transform the coal ash into a slurry, coal is separated from non-combustible components and can be fractionated by particle size as well. Coal slurry can be transferred by pipeline or with specialized pumps such as a progressive cavity pump to pump the highly abrasive, corrosive and viscous coal slurry. More than 7 billion tons of coal are mined per year (2010), using approximately 200 litres of water per ton. However, the amount of water required hinges on the surface characteristics of the coal being used. Most coal slurries require the addition of a surfactant to reduce the viscosity, ergo reduce the stress on pipelines and pumps.
Recent studies have employed new methods of slurry preparation, like using ultrasonic irradiation and a mixture of natural and synthetic surfactants to improve the stability and rheological properties of coal slurry.
Environmental concerns
Ideally, coal slurry consists only of crushed coal and water, which can be efficiently separated. In practice, the separation is significantly costly because of the large amounts of water needed and wastewater generated by the process. Furthermore, the slurry consists also of very fine coal dust that results in a waste called blackwater.
The public source identifies “Coal slurry” as product of coal preparation. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Coal, slurry and product.
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This entry incorporates text from “Coal slurry” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.