• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
• /
• v.51 no.6
• /
• pp.692-699
• /
• 2013

In this study, isothermal (350, 375, 400, 425, 450, 500, $850^{\circ}C$) experiments were carried out using a custom-made thermobalance to analyze the thermal decomposition properties of refuse plastic fuel (RPF), which is to be used as a cofiring fuel with a sub-bituminous coal at commercial circulating fluidized bed (CFB) boiler in Korea. In isothermal pyrolysis results, no change in the reaction model was observed in the temperature range of $375{\sim}450^{\circ}C$ and it was revealed that the first order chemical reaction (F1) is the most suitable among 12 reaction models. The activation energy shows similar results irrespective of application of reaction model in that the activation energy was 39.44 kcal/mol and 36.96 kcal/mol when using Arrhenius equation and iso-conversional method ($0.5{\leq}X{\leq}0.9$) respectively. Mean-while, the devolatilization time ($t_{dev}$) according to particle size (d) of RPF could be expressed as $t_{dev}=10.38d^{2.88}$ at $850^{\circ}C$, operation temperature of CFB and for even distribution and oxidation of RPF in CFB boiler, we found that the relationship of average dispersion distance (x) and particle size was $x{\leq}1.58d^{1.44}$.