Petrographic and chemical reactivity assessment of Indian high ash coal with different biomass in fluidized bed co-gasification

The reactivity of coal and biomass has been evaluated by comparing the optical and chemical changes in feed material prior and after the co-gasification. The proximate, ultimate, GCV, low-pressure N2 sorption isotherm, micropetrography, SEM and EDX spectroscopy analyses are carried out to assess the reactivity of blends of high ash Indian coal and biomass. The relative changes in parameters like surface area, pore size, and pore volume have been correlated with reacted percentage area of coal macerals and cellulose-lignin cellular structures of biomass. The Optimas image processing software is being used to mark the reacted portion of organic constituents and calculated the reactivity percentage. The bottom ash of pure coal has shown the least reacted organic matters, indicating inefficiency of high ash coal due to a large amount of inorganic and inertinite contents that is resisting the oxidation. The reactivity percentage is determined by the petrographic and SEM images, and varies from 36.34 to 99.64% and 6.61–96.22%, respectively. It is summarised that the estimation of percentage alteration of macerals and other micro-organic constituents can be used as one of the practical approaches for the assessment of the reactivity of coal and biomass. The blending ratio 6:4 of coal and press mud has shown the highest reactivity (>99.64%). The values of petrographic and SEM reactivity have shown good correlations with the carbon contents, unreacted vitrinites, mineral matters and biomass remnants. These relations have been taken into account to formulate the proposed petrographic empirically calculated reactivity (RPEC). The focus has also been made to investigate the influence of feed composition on carbon conversion and heating value of the product gas.