Fossil Fuel Foundation conference tackles the coal quality problem

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IBG - SA Instrumentation & Control Buyers' Guide

October 2014 News

The Fossil Fuel Foundation recently hosted a conference concerning the optimisation of industrial boilers and co-generation. The topics discussed included the impact that coal mining, its delivery, storage quality and burning has on the environment.

The disposal of coal discards, slurry and the use of water at the mines contributed to the discussions. To counter these difficulties, the coal mining industry is conducting research into various methods of reducing costs as well as reducing the impact of coal extraction on water resources. Coal handling in the coal supply-chain will play an ever increasing role in future. Presently the quality of as-mined coal is not sufficiently suited to the requirements of most industrial applications. Therefore, proper segregation of coal types is required to improve the quality of the coal delivered to the user.

Previously coal delivered to Eskom only required crushing before being supplied directly to the various power station stock piles by conveyors belts. This has changed in recent years and currently, most of the supplies of coal to Eskom are delivered by road and rail. Today the coal is supplied from numerous small mines where it is required to be sorted and graded to achieve Eskom’s specifications.

The quality of the raw coal being mined today is gradually declining as the better coal reserves in the central basin of the eMalaleni area are being depleted. The mining and delivering of the coal is becoming more difficult and therefore more expensive. The yield of saleable coal is becoming lower by the day putting mining operations under pressure to continue to achieve positive financial margins.

Imbalances in the varying qualities of coal burned in boilers results in low combustion efficiency. Jens Happel from MIC, a presenter at the conference commented: “Advanced methods of temperature distribution measurement, and the measurement of the coal and air flow in the individual pipes feeding each burner, can be used in model-predictive control”.

Seen at the conference (left to right): Reinhard Kock (EUtech), Dr. Tony Biddlestone (OEN), Mike Andrews (OEN Enterprises), Clemens Lindscheid (EUtech) and Jens Happel (MIC).

Once the advanced measurement technology is proved and established, the next step is the real-time model predictive optimisation based on physical models within the optimiser to consider the different goals of the operation in an objective manner. It manages the often conflicting targets to improve the combustion process according to the current operational obstacles.

The benefits of the measurement technology are achieved when the application of the optimiser, the improvement of the combustion process, the boiler operation with regard to emissions and the performance and efficiency are accurately controlled.

For more information contact OEN Enterprises, +27 (0)11 675 4447, [email protected], www.oenenterprises.co.za

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Fossil Fuel Foundation conference tackles the coal quality problem

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