Improved Recovery Boiler Performance Through Control of Combustion, Sulfur, and Alkali Chemistry

Abstract

This project involved the following objectives: 1. Determine black liquor drying and devolatilization elemental and total mass release rates and yields. 2. Develop a public domain physical/chemical kinetic model of black liquor drop combustion, including new information on drying and devolatilization. 3. Determine mechanisms and rates of sulfur scavenging in recover boilers. 4. Develop non-ideal, public-domain thermochemistry models for alkali salts appropriate for recovery boilers 5. Develop data and a one-dimensional model of a char bed in a recovery boiler. 6. Implement all of the above in comprehensive combustion code and validate effects on boiler performance. 7. Perform gasification modeling in support of INEL and commercial customers. The major accomplishments of this project corresponding to these objectives are as follows: 1. Original data for black liquor and biomass data demonstrate dependencies of particle reactions on particle size, liquor type, gas temperature, and gas composition. A comprehensive particle submodel and corresponding data developed during this project predicts particle drying (including both free and chemisorbed moisture), devolatilization, heterogeneous char oxidation, char-smelt reactions, and smelt oxidation. Data and model predictions agree, without adjustment of parameters, within their respective errors. The work performed under these tasks substantially exceeded the original objectives. 2. A separate model for sulfur scavenging and fume formation in a recovery boiler demonstrated strong dependence on both more » in-boiler mixing and chemistry. In particular, accurate fume particle size predictions, as determined from both laboratory and field measurements, depend on gas mixing effects in the boilers that lead to substantial particle agglomeration. Sulfur scavenging was quantitatively predicted while particle size required one empirical mixing factor to match data. 3. Condensed-phase thermochemistry algorithms were developed for salt mixtures and compared with sodium-based binary and higher order systems. Predictions and measurements were demonstrated for both salt systems and for some more complex silicate-bearing systems, substantially exceeding the original scope of this work. 4. A multi-dimensional model of char bed reactivity developed under this project demonstrated that essentially all reactions in char beds occur on or near the surface, with the internal portions of the bed being essentially inert. The model predicted composition, temperature, and velocity profiles in the bed and showed that air jet penetration is limited to the immediate vicinity of the char bed, with minimal impact on most of the bed. The modeling efforts substantially exceeded the original scope of this project. 5. Near the completion of this project, DOE withdrew the BYU portion of a multiparty agreement to complete this and additional work with no advanced warning, which compromised the integration of all of this material into a commercial computer code. However, substantial computer simulations of much of this work were initiated, but not completed. 6. The gasification modeling is nearly completed but was aborted near its completion according to a DOE redirection of funds. This affected both this and the previous tasks. « less