Coal Ash Content Measurement Based on Pseudo-Dual Energy X-ray Transmission

Xiufeng Zhang,Guangyuan Xie,Xingguo Liang,Taiyou Li,Jiakun Tan,Long Liang

doi:10.3390/min11121433

Abstract

The real-time ash content measurement is the fundamental condition for the timely adjustment and intelligent control of operation parameters in coal production and utilization industry. In the present work, a real-time ash content analyzer based on the pseudo-dual energy X-ray transmission was developed. The feasibility of this X-ray ash content analyzer was validated by the linear relationship between ash content and five characteristic parameters of X-ray. The conditions of wave filter, tube voltage, and tube current were optimized. The comparison between the ash contents measured by muffle furnace and the X-ray ash content analyzer was conducted in laboratory and industry. It was found that the absolute error was smaller than 1% for clean coal with ash content of approximately 10%, and the possibility of the absolute error smaller than 0.5% was higher than 85%.

Highlights

Coal is an important energy and chemical engineering resource in the world [1]
The pseudo-dual energy X-ray transmission has been used in coal separation and gangue disposal [28,29]; its application in coal ash content measurement has not been studied
The results show that the ash content measured by muffle furnace was from 9.20% to 11.15%

Summary

Introduction

Coal is an important energy and chemical engineering resource in the world [1]. The reasonable development and utilization of coal resource has meaningful significance to the economy and environment of the world, especially for the countries that have large production and consumption of coal, such as China. Timely adjustment of operation parameters in coal preparation plant could not be achieved due to the delay of ash content result that was usually obtained after several hours [2] It is important for coal industry researchers to seek real-time ash content measurement techniques. The real-time ash content measurement sensors based on induced laser [1] and X-ray fluorescence have been developed [20]. This work presents a novel real-time ash content measurement technique based on pseudo-dual energy X-ray transmission. The pseudo-dual energy X-ray transmission has been used in coal separation and gangue disposal [28,29]; its application in coal ash content measurement has not been studied. The absolute error and standard deviation between the ash contents measured by pseudo-dual energy X-ray ash content analyzer and muffle furnace were compared

Coal Sample

Set up of the X-ray Ash Content Analyzer

Optimization of Tube Voltage and Tube Current

Measurement of Wide Range Low-Moderate Ash Content

Findings

Industrial Application of X-ray Ash Content Analyzer