Qingshan Thermoelectric Plant located in Wuhan City,
Hubei Province, China, and it uses coal as a fuel. Coal combustion generates
not only gaseous pollutants like SO2 and NOx but also toxic and heavy metals to
the atmosphere. From the environmental point of view, the determination and
speciation of trace toxic and heavy metals released from coal combustion are
very important. In this work, the atomic spectroscopic methods for
determination of some trace elements were first established. Graphite furnace
atomic absorption spectrometry (GFAAS) method was used to determine the trace
Pb in standard reference material SRM 8322 (fly ash from combustion of pulverized
coal). The hydride generation atomic absorption spectrometry coupled with flow
injection analysis (HGAAS-FIA) was used to analyze the concentration of As in
SRM 8322 and the ICP-AES for determination of trace elements Co, Ni, Cu, Cr,
etc. For the laboratory research work, all the coal samples were digested with
a mixture of acids (HNO3-HF-HCLO4) after burned at 650?C for one hour. Based on the
establishment of atomic spectroscopic determination methods Tessier sequential
speciation and separation methods were used in the studies of speciation
distribution of some heavy metals in fine particles released from coal
combustion of Qingshan Thermoelectric Plant. The transition elements in two
samples from Qingshan Thermoelectric Plant (with different combustion
condition) were extracted into five fractions by sequential extraction. In each
fraction a suitable reagents with an optimum pH and time were used.
Centrifugate separation of liquid part from the solid part was used after each
fraction, the liquid part is taken for analysis and the solid part was
extracted with a suitable reagents for the next fraction and the reaction
continued for certain time. This procedure was done for the five fractions
(exchangeable, carbonate bounded, Fe-Mn oxide bounded, organic matter bounded
and residual). The experiment of the stimulant acid rain reacted with coal ash
were also done in order to evaluate the transformation of these trace elements
into water system after the fine particles of coal ash act with acid rain. The
results showed that most parts of the metal in particles are stable. In order
to study the distribution tendency of trace elements in coal, the separation of
different coal particles were done using organic solvent extraction and gravity
settlement method. The results showed that different trace elements had
different distribution tendency in coal.
Cite this paper
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