Submerged Combustion Melting

The Next Generation Melting System

DOE David Rue Gas Technology Institute 66th Glass Problems Conference

U. Of Illinois, Champaign, IL Oct. 26, 2005

SM

Submerged Combustion Melting Principle

Air-fuel or oxygen-fuel mixture is fired directly into a pool of hot melt
intense combustion direct contact heat transfer - combustion products bubble through the melt reduced NOx formation reduced CO and unburned hydrocarbon emissions High rate of heat transfer and rapid mass transfer High thermal efficiency Reduced melter size

Submerged Combustion Melting Features

Melting and mixing in a single device
No external device needs to contact the melt Short residence time from forced convective heating and mixing

Melter is simple, robust, and reliable

Small size low capital cost SCM is easily started and stopped in a few hours No hot repair work required

Compatible with other segmented melting process steps

Charging Conditioning heat recovery

GTI and GI SCM History

Gas Institute (Ukraine) developed SCM for mixed nuclear waste vitrification and industrial melting not deployed Process simplified and commercial, air-fired units operating more than 10 years for other applications two 3-ton/h rockwool SCM units in Kiev, Ukraine three 3-ton/h rockwool SCM units in Byarosa, Belarus One SCM cement aggregate unit in Norilsk Russia GTI licensed SCM for applications outside former Soviet Union GTI has patents and background IP in melting, submerged firing, and heat recovery 500-lb/h SCM unit fabricated and operated at GTI Multiple melts including basalt and sodium silicate First use of oxy-gas burners

SCM 3 ton/h Mineral Wool SCM in Belarus

SCM Furnace

Loading Feed Hopper

SCM Interior

From Melt to Mineral Wool

Molten Slag Channel

Blow Chamber

4 Wheel Fiber Spinner

Product Fiber Mat

SCM Advantages
STACK

RECUPERATOR

SEPARATION ZONE

FEEDER

MELT REMOVAL

MELT BATH

BURNERS

Energy savings >20% vs. oxy-gas melters >55% capital cost reduction Compact with very little refractory 80% refractory reduction Melt area is 15% of tank melter area (0.6 ft2/ton/day) Reduced emissions NOx >50% below oxy-gas melters CO and unburned hydrocarbons reduced >20% Rapid switching of melt composition Short residence time - rapid heat transfer Reliable, proven melting technology Feed flexibility lowers batch and feeder cost Mates with conditioning and heat recovery steps Excellent redox and color control

Approaches to Glass Melting

Single tank
Compromise simple and reliable, but non-optimized approach Holding furnaces, fining, and conditioning are needed after the melter for many glass products

Staged or segmented
Melting, mixing, refining, conditioning, heat recovery, etc. are optimized as needed for the glass product highly flexible with many potential process advantages Requires eloquent design for reliability and to avoid over-complexity and high capital cost

NGMS Project Underway at GTI

Demonstrate melting and homogenization stage of low capital cost, energy efficient NGMS process for all industrially produced glass Sponsors
DOE NYSERDA Gas industry

Consortium actively supporting development and commercialization of SCM fro NGMS

Corning Incorporated Johns Manville Owens Corning - PPG Industries, Inc. - Schott North America

Batch-Scale SCM at GTI

Lab-Scale SCM
Industry batch melted to glass Full glass range melted Low-temp. soda-lime glass High-temp hard LCD glass Borosilicate glass Scrap reinforcing fiberglass Batch feed Continuous discharge Evaluation of glass product before pilot SCM fabrication Components scaled for 0.5-1.0 ton/h pilot SCM Product glass is fully melted and homogeneous

Special Tap Designed for Glass Melts

Soda-Lime Glass

Scrap Fiberglass Melt Sampling

Pilot-Scale SCM Unit

Objective continuous feed and discharge made easier with Larger capacity melter (0.5-1.0 ton/h)\ Demonstrated platinum discharge tap Most components are in place and tested Melter, burners, cooling water chiller needed Added instrumentation into data acquisition system Multiple burners spaced to create Uniform temperature profile Desired mixing and residence time distributions Elimination of poor mixing zones in corners and along walls Flexibility built into the unit Changeable burner patterns Provisions for two or more discharge locations Provisions for two feed locations

Glass Quality Varies Dramatically

Lower-cost glass making must have BOTH High intensity melting Rapid refining Quality varies over 5 orders of magnitude SCM alone Makes fully melted homogeneous glass Only makes lowest quality glass SCM works well with all external refining methods

Acceptable Bubble Count

Glass Market
LCD Display TV Panel Float/Flat Textile Fiber Tableware Lighting Glass Container <2 ~ 25 10-20 ~ 200 Insulation Fiber ~ 400 10x better than funnel glass Seeds/Oz Relative Seed Quality 10x better than TV panel glass 10x better than float glass 1,000 - 10,000x better than container glass 100x better than container glass 10x better than container glass 2x better than container glass

TV Funnel

2x better than wool insulation fiberglass

NGMS (SCM AND Rapid Refining)

If refining is slow, the capital cost benefits of low-cost, high-intensity melting are lost Potential refining approaches include
Sonic Lab-scale tested Potentially low cost and very rapid, easily installed Helium cost is acceptable, not usable on all glasses

Helium (inert Entering gas) commercial trials

Thin film
Reduced pressure centrifugal

Limited commercial use Limited commercial use Pilot-scale tested

Particularly good SCM match, bubbles are large and no CO2 Requires good control, hardware is expensive Complex hardware, potentially very rapid

Toward Commercialization
Already completed
SCM concept Pilot-scale oncept validation, including combustion system Initial commercial use for low-quality products (mineral wool, aggregate)

Current activities through 2006

Lab-scale melting of full range of industrial glass and fiberglass scrap Batch feed and continuous discharge using oxy-gas burners CFD and physical modeling of SCM Design, fabrication, and operation of continuous 0.5-1.0 ton/h pilot-scale SCM Preparations for first industrial demo-scale SCM Design, construction of first commercial SCM making abrasives from steel industry waste and cullet (northern IN)

Next Steps
2006-2008
Plan first glass industry plant demo-scale 1-4 ton/h SCM Fiberglass or scrap fiberglass Test unit not replacing existing melter Rapid conditioning work to develop NGMS for all industrial glass compositions

2009+
Demo-scale SCM and NGMS units in consortium member plants Initial replacement of current melters with NGMS

2012+
Fully developed and commercially demonstrated NGMS using SCM Licensing of NGMS to non-consortium member glass companies

Commercialization Pathway
Expected order of market entry
Scrap fiberglass Fiberglass Specialty glass (pressed and blown) Specialty glass (optical fiber, LCD, etc.) Container glass Flat glass

Consortium agreement lays out company access priority to the NGMS technology
Consortium member companies GMIC member companies Non-GMIC glass companies