Flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion

Flue Gas Emissions From Fossil Fuel Combustion

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Flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion

Flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion refers to the combustion

Combustion

Combustion or burning is a complex sequence of exothermic chemical reactions between a fuel and an oxidant accompanied by the production of heat or both heat and light in the form of either a glow or flames, appearance of light flickering....
product gas resulting from the burning of fossil fuel

Fossil fuel

Fossil fuels or mineral fuels are fossil source fuels, that is, carbon or hydrocarbons found in the earth?s Crust .Fossil fuel range from volatile materials with low carbon:hydrogen ratios like methane, to liquid petroleum to nonvolatile materials composed of almost pure carbon, like anthracite coal....
s . Most fossil fuels are combusted with ambient air (as differentiated from combustion with pure oxygen

Oxygen

Oxygen no O2 produced; 2) O2 produced, but absorbed in oceans & seabed rock; 3) O2 starts to gas out of the oceans, but is absorbed by land surfaces and formation of ozone layer; 4-5) O2 sinks filled and the gas accumulates]]...
). Since ambient air contains about 79 volume percent gaseous nitrogen

Nitrogen

Nitrogen is a chemical element that has the symbol N and atomic number 7 and atomic mass 14.00674?. Elemental nitrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless and mostly inert diatomic gas at standard conditions, constituting 78% by volume of Earth's atmosphere....
(N₂), which is essentially non-combustible, the largest part of the flue gas

Flue gas

Flue gas is gas that exits to the atmosphere via a flue, which is a pipe or channel for conveying exhaust gases from a fireplace, oven, furnace, boiler or steam generator....
from most fossil fuel combustion is uncombusted nitrogen.

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Encyclopedia

Flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion refers to the combustion

Combustion

Fossil fuel

Oxygen

Nitrogen

Flue gas

Carbon dioxide

Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalent bond to a single carbon atom. It is a gas at standard temperature and pressure and exists in Earth's atmosphere in this state....
(CO₂) which can be as much as 10 to 15 volume percent or more of the flue gas. This is closely followed in volume by water vapor (H₂O) created by the combustion of the hydrogen in the fuel with atmospheric oxygen. Much of the 'smoke' seen pouring from flue gas stack

Flue gas stack

A flue gas stack is a type of chimney, a vertical pipe, channel or similar structure through which combustion product gases called flue gases are exhausted to the outside air....
s is this water vapor forming a cloud as it contacts cool air.

A typical flue gas from the combustion of fossil fuels will also contain some very small amounts of nitrogen oxide

Nitrogen oxide

The term nitrogen oxide typically refers to any binary compound of oxygen and nitrogen, or to a mixture of such compounds:* Nitric oxide , nitrogen oxide...
s (NOx), sulfur dioxide

Sulfur dioxide

Sulfur dioxide is the chemical compound with the formula SO2. It is produced by volcanoes and in various industrial processes. Since coal and petroleum often contain sulfur compounds, their combustion generates sulfur dioxide....
(SO₂) and particulate matter. The nitrogen oxides are derived from the nitrogen in the ambient air as well as from any nitrogen-containing compounds in the fossil fuel. The sulfur dioxide is derived from any sulfur

Sulfur

Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element that has the atomic number 16. It is denoted with the symbol S. It is an abundant Valence non-metal....
-containing compounds in the fuels. The particulate matter is composed of very small particles of solid materials and very small liquid droplets which give flue gases their smoky appearance.

The steam generators in large power plants and the process furnace

Furnace

File:Piec krepa.JPGA furnace is a device used for heating. The name derives from Latin fornax, oven. The earliest furnace was excavated at Balakot, a site of the Indus Valley Civilization, dating back to its mature phase ....
s in large refineries

Oil refinery

An oil refinery is an industrial process plant where crude oil is processed and refined into more useful petroleum products, such as gasoline, diesel fuel, asphalt, heating oil, kerosene, and liquefied petroleum gas....
, petrochemical

Petrochemical

Petrochemicals are chemical products made from raw materials of petroleum or other hydrocarbon origin. Although some of the chemical compounds that originate from petroleum may also be derived from coal and natural gas, petroleum is the major source....
and chemical plant

Chemical plant

A chemical plant is an industry Industrial process factory that manufactures chemicals, usually on a large scale. The general objective of a chemical plant is to create new material wealth via the chemical or biological transformation and or separation of materials....
s, and incinerators burn very considerable amounts of fossil fuels and therefore emit large amounts of flue gas to the ambient atmosphere. The table below presents the total amounts of flue gas typically generated by the burning of fossil fuels such as natural gas

Natural gas

Natural gas is a gas consisting primarily of methane. It is found associated with fossil fuels, in coal beds, as methane clathrates, and is created by methanogenic organisms in marshes, bogs, and landfills....
, fuel oil

Fuel oil

Fuel oil is a fractional distillation obtained from petroleum distillation, either as a distillate or a residue. Broadly speaking, fuel oil is any liquid petroleum product that is burned in a furnace or boiler for the generation of heat or used in an engine for the generation of power, except oils having a flash point of approximately and oi...
and coal

Coal

Coal is a readily combustion black or brownish-black sedimentary rock. The harder forms, such as anthracite, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure....
. The data in the table were obtained by stoichiometric calculations.

It is of interest to note that the total amount of flue gas generated by coal combustion is only 10 percent higher than the flue gas generated by natural gas combustion.

EXHAUST FLUE GAS GENERATED BY COMBUSTION OF FOSSIL FUELS

(In SI metric units and in USA customary units)

Combustion Data	Fuel Gas	Fuel Oil	Coal
Fuel properties: Gross caloric value, MJ / Nm³ Gross heating value, Btu / scf Gross caloric value, MJ / kg Gross heating value, Btu / gallon Gross caloric value, MJ / kg Gross heating value, Btu / pound Molecular weight Molecular mass The molecular mass of a chemical compound, frequently referred by the older term molecular weight and abbreviated as MW, is the mass of one molecule of that substance, relative to the unified atomic mass unit u .... Specific gravity Relative density Relative density, sometimes called specific density, is the ratio of the density of a substance to the density of a given reference material.... Gravity API gravity The American Petroleum Institute gravity, or *API gravity, is a measure of how heavy or light a petroleum liquid is compared to water. If its API gravity is greater than 10, it is lighter and floats on water; if less than 10, it is heavier and sinks.... , °API Carbon Carbon Carbon* is a chemical element with chemical symbol C and atomic number 6. As a member of group 14 on the periodic table, it is nonmetallic and tetravalence?making four electrons available to form covalent bond chemical bonds.... / hydrogen Hydrogen Hydrogen is the chemical element with atomic number 1. It is represented by the chemical symbol H. At standard temperature and pressure, hydrogen is a colorless, odorless, nonmetallic, tasteless, highly combustion and explosive Diatomic molecule gas with the molecular formula H2.... ratio by weight weight % carbon weight % hydrogen weight % oxygen Oxygen Oxygen no O2 produced; 2) O2 produced, but absorbed in oceans & seabed rock; 3) O2 starts to gas out of the oceans, but is absorbed by land surfaces and formation of ozone layer; 4-5) O2 sinks filled and the gas accumulates]]... weight % sulfur weight % nitrogen weight % ash Coal assay Coal assay techniques are specific analytical methods designed to measure the particular physical and chemical properties of coals. These methods are used primarily to determine the suitability of coal for coke , power generation or for iron ore smelting in the manufacture of steel.... weight % moisture Coal assay Coal assay techniques are specific analytical methods designed to measure the particular physical and chemical properties of coals. These methods are used primarily to determine the suitability of coal for coke , power generation or for iron ore smelting in the manufacture of steel.... Combustion air: Excess combustion air, % Wet exhaust flue gas: Amount of wet exhaust gas, Nm³/ GJ of fuel Amount of wet exhaust gas, scf / 10⁶ Btu of fuel CO₂ in wet exhaust gas, volume % O₂ in wet exhaust gas, volume % Molecular weight of wet exhaust gas Dry exhaust flue gas: Amount of dry exhaust gas, Nm³/GJ of fuel Amount of dry exhaust gas, scf / 10⁶ Btu of fuel CO₂ in dry exhaust gas, volume % O₂ in dry exhaust gas, volume % Molecular weight of dry exhaust gas	43.01 1,093 18 12 294.8 11,600 8.8 2.0 27.7 241.6 9,510 10.8 2.5 29.9	43.50 150,000 0.9626 15.5 8.1 15 303.1 11,930 12.4 2.6 29.0 269.3 10,600 14.0 2.9 30.4	25.92 11,150 61.2 4.3 7.4 3.9 1.2 12.0 10.0 20 323.1 12,714 13.7 3.4 29.5 293.6 11,554 15.0 3.7 30.7

Note: Nm³ at 0 °C and 101.325 kPa, and scf at 60 °F and 14.696 psia.

Flue gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion

See also