Poc-Scale Testing of an Advanced Fine Coal Dewatering Equipment/Technique

In the last quarterly report, it was noticed that the baseline dewatering data varied significantly. This abnormality was attributed to the use of house vacuum which varied significantly during the testing. This quarter tests were repeated using a portable vacuum pump which provided a constant vacuum of 25 inches of mercury. Using 30 secs cake drying time and 30 secs cake formation time, the high- and low-porosity ceramic leaf filters provided 21.5% and 18.0% filter cake moistures, respectively. The solids loading on the high- and low-porosity filters were 0.8 Kg/m 2 and 0.44 Kg/m 2 , respectively. Addition of 10 g/t of an anionic flocculant lowered the filter cake moisture from 22.0% to 14.0% using the high-porosity filter, and 18.0% to 13.5% using the low-porosity filter. Addition of 15 g/t of a cationic flocculant lowered filter cake moisture from 18.0% to 16.0% using the low-porosity filter. High-porosity filter did not provide any lowering of filter cake moisture, however, the solids loading increased from 1.5 kg/m 2 to 5.8 kg/m 2 at a flocculant dosage of 25 g/t. This high solids loading indicated thicker filter cake which would retain a high moisture. Among the three surfactants studied, only the non-ionic and the cationic were effective in lowering the filter cake moisture. 0.4 kg/t of a non-ionic surfactant (octyl phenoxy polyethoxy ethanol) lowered filter cake moisture from 19.5% to 16.8%; and 1 kg/t of the cationic surfactant CPCL, lowered the filter cake moisture from 19.0% to 15.8%. Addition of 0.4 kg/t of copper ions or 0.3 kg/t of aluminum ions lowered the filter cake moisture from 20.5% to 17.0%, using the low-porosity filter. The high-porosity filter which showed increase solids loading (thicker filter cakes) did not provide any lowering of the filter cake moisture. Low-porosity filter was found to be more effective in lowering the filter cake moisture than high-porosity ceramic filter. However, high-porosity was more effective in providing higher solids loading than low-porosity filter