Micro-agglomerate flotation for deep cleaning of coal. Quarterly progress report, July 1-September 30, 1996

The goals of this research program are to demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of a micro-agglomerate flotation process and to establish the essential criteria for reagent selection and system design and operation. We are investigating the use of a hybrid process - Micro-agglomerate flotation - which is a combination of oil-agglomeration and froth flotation. The basic concept is to use small quantities of oil to promote the formation of dense micro- agglomerates with minimal entrapment of water and mineral particles, and to use froth flotation to extract these micro-agglomerates from the water/dispersed-mineral phase. Since the floating units are agglomerates (about 30-50 mm in size) rather than individual coal particles (1-10 mm) the problems of froth overload and water/mineral carryover should be significantly alleviated