Potential environmental pollution hazards by coal based power plant at Jhansi (UP) India

• Published in: Environmental earth sciences 2012-12, Vol.67 (7), p.2109-2120
• Main Authors: Kisku, Ganesh Chandra, Yadav, Sandeep, Sharma, Rajnish Kumar, Negi, Mahendra Pal Singh
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Air pollution; Airborne particulates; aluminum; arsenic; Biogeosciences; cadmium; Carbon dioxide; Chemical properties; chromium; Coal; coal fly ash; Coal-fired power plants; copper; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Electric power generation; electricity; energy; Environmental hazards; Environmental impact; Environmental Science and Engineering; fineness; Flue gas; Fly ash; Geochemistry; Geology; High temperature; Hydrology/Water Resources; iron; lead; manganese; mercury; nickel; nitrogen oxides; Original Article; particle size distribution; pollutants; Ponds; Power plants; Quartz; selenium; Sulfur dioxide; temperature; Terrestrial Pollution; Trace elements; X-ray diffraction; zinc
• ISSN: 1866-6280; 1866-6299
• DOI: 10.1007/s12665-012-1651-x

Coal, a fossil fuel, is the largest source of energy for the generation of electricity in India. In order to study the potential environmental hazards by coal based power plants, particulate matters were collected using Stack Monitoring Kit and gaseous pollutants by Automatic Flue Gas Analyzer. The morphological and chemical properties, mineralogical composition and particle size distributions have been determined by SEM–EDX, XRD and CILAS. The data revealed the presence of particulate matters, SO₂, NOx in the range of 236–315, 162–238, 173–222 mg/Nm³ respectively. The emission of CO₂ was in the range of 43,004–60,115 Nm³/h with an average of 52,830 Nm³/h. Among the elements, Fe > Mn > Al > Zn > B > Ni > Cr > Cu were present in substantially higher proportion than Pb > Mo > Cd > Se > As > Hg. It was found that most of the elements were concentrated on fly ash surface rather than coal, bottom ash and pond ash. This variation may be attributed to the fineness of fly ash particles with large surface ratio to mass. Mineralogical studies of coal and fly ash by X-ray diffraction revealed the presence of mullite, quartz, cristobalite and maghemite. Presence of mullite and quartz found in fly ash indicate the conversion of complex minerals to mullite and quartz at high temperature. Transfer Coefficient was calculated to determine the ratio of the enrichment of trace elements in fly or bottom ash with respect to coal and pond ash.