Description :
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Coal fly ashes (CFA) are generated in large amounts worldwide.
Current combustion technologies allow the burning of fuels with
high sulfur content such as petroleum coke, generating non-CFA,
such as petroleum coke fly ash (PCFA), mainly from fluidized bed
combustion processes. The disposal of CFA and PCFA fly ashes can
have severe impacts in the environment such as a potential groundwater
contamination by the leaching of heavy metals and/or particulate matter
emissions; making it necessary to treat or reuse them. At present CFA
are utilized in several applications fields such as cement and concrete
production, agriculture and soil stabilization. However, their reuse is
restricted by the quality parameters of the end-product or requirements
defined by the production process. Therefore, secondary material markets
can use a limited amount of CFA, which implies the necessity of new
markets for the unused CFA. Some potential future utilization options
reviewed herein are zeolite synthesis and valuable metals extraction.
In comparison to CFA, PCFA are characterized by a high Ca content,
suggesting a possible use as neutralizers of acid wastewaters from
mining operations, opening a new potential application area for PCFA
that could solve contamination problems in emergent and mining countries
such as Chile. However, this potential application may be limited by PCFA
heavy metals leaching, mainly V and Ni, which are present in PCFA in high
concentrations.
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