Thermodynamic Study on the Formation of Acetylene during Coal Pyrolysis in the Arc Plasma Jet

Based on the principle of minimizing the Gibbs free energy, the composition of C-H-O-N-S equilibrium system about acetylene formation during the pyrolysis in arc plasma jet for four kinds of different rank-ordered coals such as Datong, Xianfeng, Yangcheng, and Luan was analyzed and calculated. The results indicated that hydrogen, as the reactive atmosphere, was beneficial to the acetylene formation. The coal ranks and the hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulfur in coal all could obviously affect the acetylene yield. The mole fraction of acetylene is the maximum when the ratio value of atom H/C was 2. The content of oxygen was related to the acetylene yield, but it does not compete with CO formation. These agreed with the experimental results, and they could help to select the coal type for the production of acetylene through plasma pyrolysis process.