Parametric Studies on PCI Performances

The pulverized coal injection (PCI) is widely utilized in the iron-making blast furnaces for its economic and environmental advantages. However, due its complexity, flow dynamics and chemical kinetics of PCI inside the raceway has not been well understood. Combustions of PCI and coke inside the raceway can be influenced by tuyere operation parameters. In this paper, a comprehensive three dimensional (3-D) multiphase flow computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was utilized to investigate the PCI and coke combustion in the lower part of a blast furnace. Systematic parametric studies were conducted to analyze the effects of the natural gas injection, coal injection, PCI rate, and oxygen enrichment on the combustion performance, which include coal burnt-out rate, coke consumption rate, raceway shape, raceway temperature and etc.