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A sulfur-resistant CuS-modified active coke for mercury removal from municipal solid waste incineration flue gas

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Abstract

Adsorption is a typical method for air pollutant removal from flue gas. A CuS-modified active coke (CuS/AC) sorbent was developed to improve the elemental mercury removal efficiency from municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) flue gas. The influences of the loading amount of CuS, reaction temperature, and flue gas components including O2, SO2, H2O, and HCl on Hg0 removal efficiency were investigated, respectively. The results showed that the mercury adsorption capacity of CuS/AC(20%) sorbent was about 7.17 mg/g with 50% breakthrough threshold, which is much higher than that of virgin active coke. The analysis of XPS indicated that HgS was the main species of mercury on spent CuS/AC, which implied that adsorption and oxidation were both included in Hg0 removal. S22− played a vital role in the oxidation of physically adsorbed Hg0. Meanwhile, the common components of MSWI flue gas exhibited no significant inhibition effect on Hg0 removal by CuS/AC sorbent. CuS/AC sorbent is a promising sorbent for the mercury removal from MSWI flue gas.

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Funding

This study was financially supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (No. 2017YFC0806300) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21677096).

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Correspondence to Zan Qu.

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Liu, W., Zhou, Y., Hua, Y. et al. A sulfur-resistant CuS-modified active coke for mercury removal from municipal solid waste incineration flue gas. Environ Sci Pollut Res 26, 24831–24839 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-019-05645-6

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