논문 상세보기
pp.94-99
The recovery potential of rare earth elements (REE) in coal ash was evaluated in this study. The previous researches were reviewed, and the physicochemical analysis of coal ash collected from a thermal power plant in Korea was conducted. According to the results of particle-size distribution, fly ash could be classificed as a fine-grained soil by unified soil classification system, and showed a uniform particle size distribution. The particle size of bottom ash was a coarse grained soil and the particle-size distribution was well graded compared to that of fly ash. However, there was no significant difference in the physicochemical composition between both the ashs and particle-size. Although REE was not found in the coal ash specimens used in this study, various valuable metallic compounds were observed. The silicate compounds showed the highest contents being 50% (by wt.), followed by 20 and 10% in aluminum oxide and iron hydroxide. There were also the trace elements in oxide forms (e. g., Ca, Mg, K). Unlike previous researches there are no REE detected in the coal ash specimens used in this study. The composition of ash depends on the coal used in the power plant and the detection limits of analytic instruments may be critical.
