Study on the preparation of novel FR-245/MCM-41 suppressant and its inhibition mechanism on oil shale deflagration flame

Oil shale development is of great significance because oil and gas resources are scarce. Research on the prevention of oil shale dust explosion is particularly important for guaranteeing the safe development and utilization of oil shale resources. In this work, the flame morphology and velocity of oil shale dust with and without MCM-41 or FR-245 were compared. Furthermore, the novel green FR-245/MCM-41 inhibitor was prepared by jet mill method and used in oil shale dust explosion for the first time. The best ratio of FR-245/MCM-41 for flame inhibition was obtained, which was 9: 1. The pyrolysis oxidation behavior of oil shale before and after adding FR-245/MCM-41 was analyzed and compared by FWO and KAS methods, respectively. The results showed that the activation energy calculated by FWO and KAS methods greatly increased after adding FR-245/MCM-41, which increased by 95.36% and 115.15% than that before adding inhibitor, respectively. Significantly, the activation energy is particularly high for two methods when α between 0.2 and 0.6, due to that MCM-41 and FR-245 coexisted to limit the oxidation of oil shale. For α between 0.7 and 0.9, the activation energy is still high because of the existence of MCM-41. Combining the oil dust flame propagation behavior with the characterization results before and after explosion, the physical-chemical synergy mechanism of oil dust flame propagation inhibition was revealed. •A novel green FR-245/MCM-41 suppressant was prepared by jet mill method.•Pyrolysis before and after adding suppressant was studied thermodynamically.•FR-245/MCM-41 was used to suppress oil shale deflagration flame for the first time.•Physical and chemical synergistic inhibition mechanism of oil shale is proposed.