Integrated thermal behavior and compounds transition mechanism of municipal solid waste incineration fly ash during thermal treatment process

Thermal behavior of municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) fly ash is extremely complicated due to the simultaneously occurred reactive processes and the products with different chemical compositions, therefore, the investigation of chemical compounds transition behavior and mechanism during the integrated thermal process is of great significance. In this study, the macro-thermal treatment of fly ash and thermo-gravimetric analysis via non-isothermal methods were carried out and Malek method was firstly introduced to explore the mechanism of multi-step reaction for fly ash. The mineral transition results suggested that the halite, sylvite in the raw fly ash transformed to more complex crystals in treated samples, such as chlorellestadite, polyhalite and enstatite during the thermal process. And the heavy metals leaching concentration decreased with the temperature increased from 300 degrees C to 1200 degrees C, and the leaching values were lower than the standard limitation after thermal treatment. In addition, three major steps of fly ash reactions (300-380 degrees C, 650-750 degrees C and 890-1130 degrees C) during the thermal process were observed and expressed by first order reaction for the first step, three-dimensional diffusion for the second step and three dimensions of limiting surface reaction between both phases for the third step, respectively. The kinetic study revealed that the mineral transition process was in well accordance with the simulated reaction mechanism during the thermal treatment. The obtained results are expected to provide the research basis for studying detailed thermal characteristics and reaction mechanism during the thermal treatment of MSWI fly ash. (C) 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Automated summary

The thermal behavior of municipal solid waste incineration fly ash is complex due to simultaneous reactive processes and different chemical compositions of products. The study focused on investigating the transition behavior and mechanism of chemical compounds during the integrated thermal process. Malek method was introduced to explore the multi-step reaction mechanism for fly ash, revealing mineral transitions and reduced heavy metal leaching concentrations with increasing temperature. The kinetic study showed that the mineral transition process aligned well with the simulated reaction mechanism during thermal treatment.