Fly Ash

Name:
Fly Ash
Detailed information:
The very fine ash produced by combustion of powdered coal with forced draft and often carried off with the flue gases. Special equipment is required for effective recovery, e.g., electrostatic precipitators. Fly ash is a mixture of alumina, silica, unburned carbon, and various metallic oxides. It is reported to have mutagenic properties after passing through stack precipitators. The alumina is recoverable by calsintering, which makes it a possible alternative source of aluminum.

Use:

Cement additive for oil-well casings, absorbent for oil spills (silicone-coated), to replace lime in scrubbing sulfur dioxide from flue gas, as a filler in plastics, source of germanium (England), proposed as catalyst for coal liquefaction, removal of heavy metals from industrial wastewaters, separation of oil-sand tailings.

See Calsintering.