Studies on the cleaning potentialties of IB valley coal by washability investigations

Abstract

India has about seven percent of the world's proven coal reserves. More than 50% of the total energy requirements in India are met from coal. It is estimated that the reserves are enough to meet India's needs for more than 50 years. But, Indian coals, contain high ash wherein the extraneous material was intimately mixed in the coal matrix during the formation stage, causing a high level of impurities in the run-of-mine (ROM) material. These coals possess difficult to very difficult washability characteristics. Beneficiation of high-ash non coking coals of India has become the prerequisite for improving the overall economics and efficiency of all the downstream processes. This article describes the washability characteristics of a typical non coking coal from the Ib Valley Coalfields aiming at 34% ash level in the clean coal as per the stipulations laid by environmental gazette notification of the Government of India. Conventional float-and-sink testing was used to determine the yield of clean coal. A suitable flow scheme for beneficiation of the non-coking coal was suggested.