Effect of Operating Parameters of a Liquid Spray System on Coal Dust Suppression

Abstract

Currently, coal mines in the United States rely primarily on two methods for controlling dust. The first utilizes large volumes of outside air to ventilate and dilute the dust to acceptable concentrations. The second method involves water used in various ways, primarily in the form of liquid spray systems. It is very important to know the effect of operating parameters of the liquid spray system on coal dust suppression in order to improve its performance. Factors such as the type of coal mined, water pump pressure, wetting agent used and its concentration, and size of liquid droplets may all affect the performance of such a spray system. Because of the number of possible combinations that have to be examined in order to study the full impact of all variables, the factorial analysis method can be used to reduce the number of tests that are necessary to study the effect of each and the combined effect interaction on overall dust suppression performance. Test results showed that there was a small interaction effect between coal type and surfactant concentration but there was a significant interaction effect between coal type and water pump pressure. Namely, increasing pump pressure had much more impact on dust suppression in lignite than both bituminous and anthracite coals. However, the effect of surfactant concentration variation on different coal was moderate.Currently, coal mines in the United States rely primarily on two methods for controlling dust. The first utilizes large volumes of outside air to ventilate and dilute the dust to acceptable concentrations. The second method involves water used in various ways, primarily in the form of liquid spray systems. It is very important to know the effect of operating parameters of the liquid spray system on coal dust suppression in order to improve its performance. Factors such as the type of coal mined, water pump pressure, wetting agent used and its concentration, and size of liquid droplets may all affect the performance of such a spray system. Because of the number of possible combinations that have to be examined in order to study the full impact of aft variables, the factorial analysis method can be used to reduce the number of tests that are necessary to study the effect of each and the combined effect interaction on overall dust suppression performance. Test results showed that there was a small interaction effect between coal type and surfactant concentration but there was a significant interaction effect between coal type and water pump pressure. Namely, increasing pump pressure had much more impact on dust suppression in lignite than both bituminous and anthracite coals. However, the effect of surfactant concentration variation on different coal was moderate.

Department(s)

Mining Engineering

Keywords and Phrases

Coal Mining; Dust Suppression; Liquid Spray Systems

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

0317-0926

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2000 Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Jan 2000

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