Crystallization of Synthetic Blast Furnace Slags Pertaining to Heat Recovery

Heat recovery from blast furnace slags is often contradicted by another requirement, to generate amorphous slag for its use in cement production. As both the rate and extent of heat recovery and slag structure are determined by its cooling rate, a relation between the crystallization kinetics and the cooling conditions is highly desired. In this study, CaO-SiO2-Al2O3-MgO (CSAM) slags with different basicities were studied by Single Hot Thermocouple Technique (SHTT) during isothermal treatment and non-isothermal cooling. Their time-temperature-transformation (TTT) and continuous-cooling-transformation (CCT) diagrams were plotted and compared with each other. Furthermore, kinetic parameters such as the Avrami exponent (n), rate coefficient (K) and effective activation energy of crystallization (E_A) were found by analysis of data obtained from in-situ observation of glassy to crystalline transformation and image analysis. Also, the dependence of nucleation and growth rates of crystalline phases were quantified as a function of time, temperature, and slag basicity. Together with the observations of crystallization front, they facilitated establishing the dominant mechanisms of crystallization. In addition to the experimental work, a mathematical model was developed and validated that predicts the amount of crystallization during cooling. A second mathematical model that calculates temperature history of slag during its cooling was coupled with the above model, to allow studying the effect of parameters such as the slag/air ratio and granule size on the heat recovery and glass content of slag.Ph.D