Demonstration program for wood/coal cofiring in western Pennsylvania
- Univ. of Pittsburgh, PA (United States). Dept. of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering
National interest in the combustion of wood and wood/coal mixtures is growing rapidly in response to the world-wide concern for global warming, the US concern for SO{sub 2} and NOx emissions, and regional interest in expanding the utilization of forest products and byproducts. Throughout the forest product sector, combustion of wood and wood byproducts is widely practiced. Numerous small combustors for use by the homeowner to burn seasoned firewood are on the market. Lumber and paper mills produce large amounts of raw wood wastes, which many of them combust in industrial boilers to provide process heat and mechanical energy for their operations. In the case of both small and large combustors, the feed systems, burners, thermal recovery systems and flues have been specially designed for 100% wood use. Within the industrial and utility coal-fired boiler sector, furnaces are designed for 100% coal combustion and there is very little experience with wood/coal cofiring in these systems. Moreover, what experience is out there has not been documented in the open literature. Thus, it is proving very difficult for operators of coal-fired boilers to join quickly the national effort to increase wood firing. To provide assistance in this direction, the Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry Program of the US Department of Agriculture Forest Service has initiated a program with the University of Pittsburgh to demonstrate wood/coal cofiring into stoker and fluid-bed boilers in the western Pennsylvania region. The first project under this program was a demonstration at the traveling-grate stoker boiler of the Pittsburgh Brewing Company. The program staff at the University is currently working on several new projects: initiating commercial wood/coal cofiring at the brewery, organizing a demonstration at the underfed stoker boiler plant at a state-owned facility, conceptualizing projects for a spreader stoker boiler at a federally-owned facility and a fluid-bed boiler operated by an independent power producer, and consulting with several companies and agencies.
- OSTI ID:
- 349130
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-980985--; ISBN 1-890977-15-2
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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