Energy Recycling of Recycled Plastic-Resin Powder : Comparison of Combustion Characteristics Using Recycled PET-and PE-Resin Powder

Abstract

In order to utilize chemical properties of recycled plastic resin as hydro-carbon fuel for industrial burner systems, a commercial LPG-fueled ceramic burner has been improved to burn plastic resin powder as an auxiliary fuel. Within the range of a replacement rate of PET-resin powder of 0 ∿ 30%, the proposed twin-fueled burner exhibited reasonable combustion characteristics in the in-furnace operation. In this paper, two kinds of plastic resin powder; polyethylene terephthalate resin, PET-powder, and polyethylene resin, PE-powder, are employed as auxiliary fuels and effects of the kind of plastic resin on the out-of-furnace and in-furnace combustion characteristics are investigated under a constant replacement rate of 30% and a constant total heat input of 11.6 kW, while the overall equivalence ratio is varied in the range of 0.63 ∿ 1.4. It is found that the in-furnace operation using PET-resin powder exhibits better combustion properties and controllability of reducing atmosphere than that using PE-resin Powder.