Selective agglomeration of fine coal using a water-in-oil emulsion

Fine coal may be separated from an aqueous suspension of coal and mineral particles through the application of a pure oil. The pure oil preferentially wets and agglomerates only the coal, forming a high quality, granular product. However, the use of the pure oil also comes at a relatively high cost and this cost prohibits commercial implementation of this process. In this work a new, economic binder, was introduced. This binder consisted of a high internal phase water-in-oil emulsion which was 95 vol% water and 5 vol% organic. This type of binder was selected as it possessed the hydrophobic surface functionality of oil while the space filling functionality of the binder was primarily satisfied by the dispersed water droplets within the emulsion. The application of this emulsion in the agglomeration process led to a 10-fold reduction in the organic liquid dosage required to achieve agglomeration as compared a pure oil binder. It was also observed that the agglomeration time required when using the emulsion binder was one order of magnitude less than required when using a pure oil binder. This variation was considered to result from the five orders of magnitude difference in the viscosity of the two binders. (C) 2016 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.