COAL FLOTATION OF LOW-GRADE PENNSYLVANIA ANTHRACITE SIL TS

Special Research Report SR-39 There is very littl~ reclamation of coal from the enormous amount of low-grade Pennsylvania anthracite silts, even though some high-grade silts have been retreated. The low-grade silts are difficult to reclaim by the commonly used coal preparation methods,inasmuch as they are as high as 53 per cent mineral matter and are extremely fine in particle size. Therefore most silts are still considered as waste materials. Attempts have been made by some power plants to use directly these lowgrade anthracite silts without beneficiation. This was handicapped, however, by the difficulties experienced in feeding these sticky silts into the furnace. The above reasons led to the present investigation for finding a suitable concentration process to recover the valuable coal from the low-grade Pennsylvania anthracite silts.