Energy and Chemical Recovery in the Kraft Pulping Process

The kraft process is the most important method for producing wood pulp for papermaking. It uses a hot
aqueous solution of NaOH and Na2S to dissolve the wood lignin and separate the pulp fibres. The
recovery of the cooking chemicals is attained through: i) concentrating the spent liquor (black liquor); ii)
burning the concentrated black liquor in a recovery boiler to produce steam and power and molten
smelt, Na2S and Na2CO3; iii) dissolving the smelt in water to produce green liquor, which is then
causticized with lime (CaO) to regenerate NaOH; and iv) separating the precipitated lime mud (CaCO3)
from the white liquor, and burning the mud in a lime kiln to regenerate lime.

For each ton of pulp produced, kraft pulp mills

generate roughly ten tons of weak black liquor which
contains water, spent chemicals and dissolved wood
components. Although concentrated black liquor is an
important biofuel, it is difficult to burn because of its
high ash content from the pulping chemicals, low ash
melting temperature and low heating value. Massive
ash deposit accumulation on heat transfer surfaces is
a persistent problem in many recovery boilers.
Deposits drastically reduce the thermal efficiency of
the boiler, and in severe cases, may lead to complete
plugging of flue gas passages, requiring up to two
days of costly downtime to remove the deposits. The
combustion environment in the boiler is extremely
corrosive, limiting the boiler operating steam
temperatures and pressures, which affect the power
production efficiency.

The overall thermal efficiency of the recovery boiler

depends strongly on the solids content of the
concentrated black liquor, which in turn depends on
the performance of the evaporators. The thermal
efficiency of the lime kiln, on the other hand,
determines the amount of fossil fuel required for
calcining lime. A well-insulated, controlled, modern
lime kiln may need as little as half of the fuel used by
a poorly-operated kiln. There are many problems
encountered in lime kiln operation, including poor lime quality, poor kiln refractory performance, ring
formation on kiln lining surfaces, dusting, scaling on induced-draft fan blades, and gaseous emissions.
These problems greatly reduce the kiln throughput and reliability.