Treatment of Coal Fly Ash And Its Environmentally Friendly Use In Rubber And Plastic Industry

Abstract Coal power plants are the major contributor of electricity but these power plants are also producing waste in the form of coal fly ash (CFA). However, it can cause high risk of environmental pollution and pulmonary diseases in humans. Plastic waste is also a problematic waste for many countries in terms of its reuse and recycling. Therefore, this study aims to reuse the waste product (CFA) of coal power plants in rubber conveyer belt instead of calcium carbonate or talcum powder and in recycling of plastic propylene as bonding filler material instead of barium sulfate to increase the durability of plastic products and reduce cost, CFA waste and plastic waste. For this purpose, CFA was treated by different pulverization techniques for the production of conveyor belt. The study found that the most favorable technique was shear based pulverization technique. Application of CFA with rubber was compared with two different chemicals (calcium carbonate and talcum powder) and found that the elongation at break of conveyor belt was 35% increased and abrasion volume was 64% reduced by using treated CFA. Furthermore, CFA was used in molten mass of plastic instead of barium sulfate and the results showed that the use of CFA has improved the dimensional stability of plastic material reducing the cost per ton by 2410 CNY. The study concluded that the performance was increased by applying CFA with a reduction in price as compared to other chemicals.