Research on chemical resistance characteristics of water-immersed coal with different metamorphic degrees

In order to reduce the risk of spontaneous combustion of coal left after long-term flooding in the goaf of the mine, in this paper, the inhibitory properties of different inhibitors on two kinds of water-immersed coals with different metamorphic degrees were studied in depth. The experiment selected Pingzhuang brown coal and Shaqu coking coal as research objects. The raw coal and water-immersed coal samples were compared and analyzed by thermogravimetric experiment method and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy experiment method. The study showed that the activation temperature of brown coal and coking coal decreased by 7.91 and 2.25 °C respectively, and the activation energy decreased by 43.18 kJ/mol and 20.58 kJ/mol respectively. The natural tendency of coal was enhanced after water immersion, and water immersion had a greater impact on low-metamorphic brown coal. After adding four kinds of inhibitors, MgCl₂, TEMPO, TPPI and PA to the two water-immersed coals, it was found that TPPI could significantly reduce the heat release rate of water-immersed brown coal, and the reduction value was 10.49 W/mg. The dry cracking temperature of water-immersed brown coal increased by 11.75 °C, and PA greatly increased the combustion activation energy of water-immersed coking coal by 25.77 kJ/mol. Meanwhile, it was found from the microscopic active groups that TTPI increased the content of water-immersed brown coal ether bonds by 4.84%. The absorption peak intensity of oxygen-containing functional groups such as C=O was significantly weakened. Similarly, PA also produced a large number of stable ethers in water-immersed coking coal, whose content increased by 5.21%, and the hydroxyl content decreased most significantly. The decomposition of TPPI into phosphoric acid after heating can inhibit the growth of active groups such as a large number of oxygen-containing functional groups in the water-immersed brown coal, thereby reducing the risk of spontaneous combustion. As a metal chelator, PA can reduce the catalytic effect of metal ions in water-immersed coking coal with fewer active groups, and inhibit coal spontaneous combustion by generating stable metal complexes to increase activation energy. This indicated that TTPI had the best inhibitory effect on water-immersed brown coal, while PA was more suitable for water-immersed coking coal.