The Nature Of Quartz In Underground Coal Mines (850465cf-6edb-453f-abd7-9dc825b82c5b)

A three-year project focusing on the depth profiling of respirable coal mine dust particles using scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy dispersive X-ray analysis resulted in the development of statistically classified particle-behavior models. The models depict the changing silicon fraction for particles at 5-, 7-, 9-, and 11-keV accelerating voltages, thereby giving a clear indication of the nature of various types of mineral particles. This paper focuses on the results for respirable quartz particles sampled from five underground coal mines across the US. Through statistical analysis of results the relationship between the fraction of surface available quartz in respirable dust samples and coal rank is established for three Pennsylvania coal seams.