Assessment of spontaneous heating susceptibility of coal seams by experimental techniques - a comparative study

Abstract

Mine fires due to spontaneous heating of coal is a common, but major problem in the coal mining industry. They not only endanger the lives of men in mines, but also cause considerable economic losses to the organization. Since all coals are not susceptible to spontaneous heating to the same extent, it is essential to assess their degree of proneness in order to plan advance precautionary measures. This paper describes the determination of spontaneous heating susceptibility of coal samples by three different experimental methods viz., crossing point temperature (CPT), differential thermal analysis (DTA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The above tests were carried on 30 coal samples collected from different Indian Coalfields and a comparative analysis has been presented