The research results and application possibilities of fly ash microspheres

The paper presents a short description of aluminosilicate materials which are microspheres derived from fly ash from coal combustion in power stations. The most important properties of such materials, the conditions of their formation, methods of obtaining and selected areas of application are discussed. The microspheres that were tested came from the Power Plant Skawina. Analysis of particle size and wall thickness of the microspheres and the analysis of the chemical composition have been carried out. This article also presents preliminary results of the alkaline activation of the microspheres in order to obtain a fraction within the zeolite. Alkali activation was carried out in several variants, using aqueous solutions of sodium hydroxide and the obtained results allow to determine the suitability of the microspheres to obtain zeolites in their substrate. Observations with the scanning electron microscope showed the existence of significant quantities of specific forms of zeolites, after alkaline activation processes of microspheres