Reed canary-grass ash composition and its melting behaviour during combustion

Spring harvested reed canary-grass (RCG) with various chemical compositions was combusted in a 180 kW boiler. The ash melting behaviour was studied and the ash was analysed. Estimation of melting behaviour was done by ASTM fusion test, a bench-scale fluidized-bed combustion test (5 kW), and by extracting melting behaviours from the ternary phase diagram SiO2–CaO–K2O. The initial melting temperatures seem to be similar for the different samples; however, for low ash content (3–4% DM) higher portions of melt occurred in the lower temperature range <1200°C and for high ash content fuels (5–10%) more melting occurred in a higher temperature range, >1500°C.