09170 Corrosion of Ceramic Bed in Regenerating Thermal Oxidizers

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Product Number: 51300-09170-SG

ISBN: 09170 2009 CP

Author: Rodney J. Schwartz, Alex Nadezhdin and Valeri Mandroussov

Publication Date: 2009

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Regenerating thermal oxidizers (RTO) are widely used across the US to destroy fugitive emissions from wood-processing plants and other industries. The use of ceramic beds in order to store and recover significant portions of the heat energy used for oxidizing the exhaust gasfuel mix allows achieving up to 97% thermal efficiency. Dryers of wood chips in a typical wood processing plant are usually heated by burning wood-based biomass material. Some of the ash from the combustion is transported through the dryer and filtration devices making its way into the RTO and associated ceramic heat exchange beds. In addition, small wood particles entrained in the dryer exhaust gas escape capture as well and end up being burned inside the ceramic bed contributing to the total ash loading to the RTO. This ash typically contains Sodium and Potassium salts, which when exposed to high temperatures of the upper portions of the heat recovery bed and combustion chamber, can react with the ceramic materials contributing to their deterioration within a relatively short service period. The paper discusses factors responsible for the deterioration of the ceramic material within the heat recovery bed and in particular, the effects of temperature. It describes methods of semi-quantitative evaluation of the rate and extent of deterioration, which can be used to predict the time for changing the media.

Key words: RTO, ceramic bed, Alkali corrosion, phase transformation