MetalliFix: A Novel Scrubber Additive for the Capture and Sequestration of Oxidized and Elemental Mercury

As regulatory requirements for control of mercury emissions from coal fired power plants become better understood by the utility industry it is becomming clear that addressing the issue of scrubber re-emission will be critical component of an overall compliance strategy. MetalliFix is a novel, three component chemical mix which is fed as slurry to a wet FGD in order to capture and sequester Hg+2 and Hg0 as insoluble mercury sulfide. When converted to mercury sulfide, Hg+2 is no longer able to reduced to Hg0 in the scrubber slurry, and, therefore, re-emission is significantly reduced or eliminated. This paper presents data from recent testing conducted by EERC on the impact of MetalliFix on scrubber mercury emissions from a Texas lignite coal generated flue gas. Preliminary indications from these tests show that MetalliFix essentially eliminated what had been a significant level of re-emission, and may have brought about a direct reduction in elemental mercury emissions as well.