This study investigated deposit formation of biomass fly ash on steel tubes, in a lab-scale Entrained Flow Reactor. Experiments were conducted using model biomass fly ash, prepared from mixtures of K2Si4O9, KCl, K2SO4, CaO, SiO2 and KOH, as well as three different boiler fly ashes: a wood fly ash, a straw fly ash, and a straw + wood cofired fly ash. The fly ashes were injected into the reactor, to form deposits on an air-cooled deposit probe, simulating deposit formation on superheater tubes in boilers. The results revealed that increasing flue gas temperature, probe surface temperature, time, fly ash flux and fly ash particle size increased the rate of deposit formation. However, increasing flue gas velocity resulted in a decrease in the deposit formation rate. A mechanistic model was developed for predicting deposit formation in the reactor. Inertial impaction was the primary mechanism of deposit formation, when pure K2Si4O9, SiO2 or CaO was injected into the reactor, forming deposits only on the upstream side of the steel tube. However, feeding KCl, K2SO4 or KOH into the reactor resulted in deposit formation on both sides of the steel tube, via condensation, thermophoresis, and inertial impaction.

Proceedings of the 26th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 14-17 May 2018, Copenhagen, Denmark, pp. 440-452