Waste Gas Treatment Of Melting Furnaces For The Production Of Soda-Lime Glass - Experiences With Neutrec Technology And Technical-Economical Comparison With Other Cleaning Technologies

After providing an overview of Solvay's contribution to the glass industry, this paper gives some results on possible solutions available for emissions neutralisation and recycling opportunities of the reaction products in the melting process. It was found that as an alkaline reagent, sodium bicarbonate offers a good flexibility, having excellent removal performances of acid gaseous compounds. Particularly advantageous is the possibility of recycling the neutralisation products, made up mainly of sodium sulphate. The excellent removal performance of sodium bicarbonate and the possibility of recycling the neutralisation products give to sodium bicarbonate economic advantages, as compared with hydrated lime. In this paper, comments are reported on the current and future legislation of EU countries concerning emission values in the atmosphere.