Bed Agglomeration Characteristics during Cocombustion of Animal Waste with Municipal Solid Waste in a Bubbling Fluidized-Bed BoilerA Thermodynamic Modeling Approach

Full-scale waste combustion tests showed that adding animal waste (AW) to municipal solid waste (MSW) prevented bed agglomeration, and the reason for this finding was not fully understood. This study uses thermodynamic modeling to investigate the composition of equilibrium products for two combustion scenarios: monocombustion of MSW (the reference case) and cocombustion of AW with MSW (the AW case). The modeling was performed using FactSage, and experimental data obtained during the full-scale combustion tests were used as input data for the calculations. The results of equilibrium modeling, together with information extracted from ternary phase diagrams, suggest higher bed temperature as the primary cause for formation of bed agglomerates in the reference case. In addition, melt-induced agglomeration is suggested as the bed agglomeration mechanism in this case. In the AW case, however, reduced bed temperature, as well as enriched calcium phosphate and sulfate in the bottom ashes are considered to significantly decrease the slagging tendency.