FUEL PREPARATION APPARATUS AND METHOD

An apparatus and method for fuel preparation for example by milling and drying to produce a pulverous fuel supply are described. The apparatus includes a fuel preparation unit adapted to receive a mixture of fuel and a gas and to prepare the fuel for combustion in a pulverous state; an output conduit defining an output flow path for a mixture of pulverous fuel and gas from the fuel preparation unit; a phase separator disposed to receive the mixture from the output conduit and to separate the mixture into a gas phase comprising at least a major part of the gas from the mixture and a fuel phase comprising the pulverous fuel; a gas phase conduit defining a flow path for the gas phase from the separator; a heat exchanger preferably being a process fluid heat exchanger such as a feed water heat recovery heat exchanger fluidly connected to the gas phase conduit and adapted to receive and dry the gas phase. The method applies the principles embodied in the apparatus.