Research on the co-combustion characteristics and kinetics of rice husk hydrochar with anthracite

Co-combustion of anthracite and hydrochar derived from hydrothermal carbonization with process water recirculation was proposed as an effective way to achieve a transition to low-carbon energy in industries that rely heavily on coal combustion. In this study, thermogravimetric analysis and model-free methods were employed to investigate the co-combustion characteristics and kinetics of anthracite and hydrochar. The results demonstrate that the carbon content of hydrochar is lower than that of anthracite, but the volatile content is higher than that of anthracite, indicating that hydrochar has better combustion performance. There is a synergistic effect in the co-combustion reaction of hydrochar and anthracite. With the increase of the hydrochar addition ratio, the ignition and burnout temperatures of anthracite decrease gradually. With the increase of temperature rise rate, the combustion reaction is enhanced and the combustion performance of anthracite is improved under the fixed mixing ratio. According to the calculation of combustion activation energy by Flynn-Wall-Ozawa and Kissenger-Akahira-Sunose methods, the apparent activation energy of the mixed samples gradually decreases with the increase of combustion conversion rate. When the addition of hydrochar is 60 %, the average apparent activation energy of the mixed sample is the lowest, which is 66.51 kJ mol−1 and 54.62 kJ mol−1, respectively.