FUELS AND COMBUSTION

METHOS OF COAL ANALYSIS

Submitted to:
Mrs. Kangana Desai
Prof. FTC
GSFC UNIVERSITY
 Prepared by:
 Pruthvisinh H. Jadav (17BE01020)
 Jaydeep Khadsaliya (17BE01021)
 Khatra Yash (17BE01022)
 Meet Khunt (17BE01023)
 Meet Kotadiya (17BE01024)
 Vaibhav Kotadiya (17BE01025)
COAL ANALYSIS
 The main purpose of sample coal analysis is to
determine the quality or rank of the coal anlong with
its intrinsic charcteristic . Futhur more these data will
be used as the fundamental consideration of coal
trading and its utilization.
METHODS OF COAL ANALYSIS
 PROXIMATE ANALYSIS
 ULTIMATE ANALYSIS
PROXIMATE ANALYSIS
Proximate analysis
 The proximate analysis of coal determines the:
1. Moisture content
2. Volatile matter
3. Ash
4. Fixed carbon
Moisture
 Moisture may occur in various forms within a coal:
•Surface or free moisture: water held on the surface of coal particles or
minerals;

•Inherent (residual) moisture: water held by capillary action within the

pores/capillaries of coal;

•Decomposition moisture: water produced from the thermal decomposition

of organic constituents of coal;
 There are various methods to depends on the type of
moisture, classified as:
1. Equilibrium moisture
2. Total moisture
3. Moisture in air dried sample
 Here the pulverized coal is heated at a temperature of 105-
110 Celsius. Water molecules gets evaporated. After the
heating process is complete, mass analysis will give us the
fraction of water in coal
ASH
 Ash is the residue remaining after the combustion of c
oal in air and is derived from inorganic comple
xes present in the original coal substance and from
associated mineral matter. Therefore, the result of
the determination is ‘ash’ and not ‘ash content’ as co
al does not contain any ash.
 The ash yield is commonly used as an indication of
the grade or quality of a coal since it provides a meas
uEr of the incombustible material.
Ash determination
 Ash is determined by weighing the residue remaining
after burning 1 gm of coal. Coal powder is burnt in an
furnace at 500 Celsius at about 60 min at a uniform
rate. The sample is then heated at 850 Celsius for 60
min. When the burning period is over, the residues are
weighed and are reported as mass fraction.
VOLATILE MATTER
 Volatile matter (VM) in coal refers to the thermal decomposition
products liberated when coal is heated at high temperature i
n the absence of air.
 The VM obtained during the paralysis of coal consists mainly of
combustible gases such as hydrogen, carbon monoxide, hydroc
arbons, tar, ammonia as well as incombustible gases like carbo
n dioxide and steam.
Determination of volatile matter
 Approx 1 gm of pulverized coal is heated in a covered
crucible at a certain temp. for about 7 minutes. The
temperature according to ATSM is about 950+25
Celsius.
 The result obtained from standard tests are expressed
as percentage mass fraction, generally on air dried
basis.
FIXED CARBON
 Fixed carbon in coal is the carbon that remains in the coal
sample after volatile matter is driven off. This differs from
the ultimate carbon content of the coal because some
carbon is lost in hydrocarbons with volatiles.
 The ratio of fixed carbon to proximate VM, the fuel
ratio, is used as a measure of combustion reactivity and
burnout.
 Fixed carbon is not determined directly, it is calculated by
subtracting from the 100 the resultant summation of moisture,
VM and ash.
ULTIMATE ANALYSIS
Ultimate analysis
 Ultimate analysis determines the percentage mass fraction of
the major constituents of coal such as carbon, hydrogen, sulp
hur, nitrogen, and, usually by difference, oxygen.

 The ultimate analysis is used with the calorific value of the coal
to perform combustion calculations such as the determination of
coal feed rates, boiler performance and sulphur emissions.
CARBON AND HYDROGEN
 Carbon and hydrogen account for 70–95% and 2–
6 wt.% , respectively, of the organic substance of coal, and are
thought by some to be the most important constituents of coal.
 For the determination of carbon and hydrogen involve combustion of coal
in a closed system impervious to gases. All the hydrogen and carbon is
converted in to H2O and CO2.
 Chlorine and oxide of sulphur are usually removed fro the
combustion gasses by passage over lead chromate and silver
while nitrogen oxide are removed by manganese dioxide.
 The water and carbon dioxide are then separated by
condensation. The remaining residues are analyzed by
mass fraction.
 NITROGEN
 For nitrogen, Kjeldahl method is used.
 In the Kjeldahl method, pulverised coal is heated with concentrated
sulphuric acid containing potassium sulphate, in the presence of a cat
alyst
to convert the nitrogen into ammonium sulphate. The ammonia is then
released, recovered by distillation and determined by titration.
 The released ammonia is send for stoichiometric analysis for the percentage of
nitrogen.
SULPHUR
 The three most widely used test methods for sulphur determina
tion are the Eschka method, the bomb washing method, and
the high-‐ temperature combustion method.
 The main poins that are common in these methods are that coal
powder is mixed with manganese oxide / anhaydrous sodium carbonate
.
 The mixture is then heated at an temperature of 800-825 Celsius and is
held at this temperature until the oxidation is complete.
 The sulphur compounds are then reacts with oxides to form sulphur
oxide.
 These sulphur oxide react with barium chloride
solution, which forms barrium sulphate. The
precipitate is filtered, ashed and weighed.

 After the weighed is obtained, mass fraction of sulphur

is obtained by mass analysis.
Reference
 Article on coal sampling and analysis by Qian Zhu
 Published on April 2014
THANK YOU