Air cooling system for cement clinker - where dust free air leaving indirect cooler is fed up direct grate cooler to increase thermal efficiency

摘要

The roasted clinker or similar material leaves a furnace and enters a direct cooler, esp. a grate cooler, from which the clinker enters a crusher and then travels downwards via gravity through an indirect cooler. A row of fans is employed to blow air up the indirect cooler so the air becomes hot while cooling the clinker; and the hot air is then fed to the grate cooler and used to cool clinker travelling along the grate. The fans employed to blow air up the indirect cooler are pref. sufficiently powerful to drive the hot air to the direct cooler without the use of additional fans located between the two coolers. In conventional plant, the air leaving the indirect cooler is dust free and is usually released to atmos., but this wastes the heat picked up by the air while travelling up the indirect cooler. The invention exploits the heat in this air.