Determine and Verify Available Emission Data and to List the Areas Lacking Data on Air Emissions from Industrial Black Coal Fired Boilers in Australia

The Commonwealth Government requires that all Australian fuel users regularly report emissions from their fuel burning plant. These reported results then enter the public domain and are available to all interested parties. This means that Australian industrial users of coal are required by the Commonwealth Department of Environment to regularly report a wide range of emission data, including particulate matter, oxides of sulphur, oxides of nitrogen, halogens, trace elements and a list of organic substances.

In order to assist fuel users, the Department has issued a National Pollutant Inventory "Emission Estimation Technique Manual for Combustion in Boilers". The information included in the Manual has largely been taken from USEPA results for North American coals, relevant to North American coal fired industrial boiler plant. As a result much of the information is not relevant to Australian black coal and use of the data will often result in higher emissions being reported than those that would occur from the use of Australian black coal.

To address this situation the relevant emission data for Australian black coal fired industrial boilers was sought, evaluated and used to generate emission factors, which have been included in the Report.

In addition the Manual was critically reviewed and the relevant comments are included in the Report.

Emission information on many minor emissions was not available or was limited and insufficient to be used to generate reliable emission factors. However, because of their low level of significance and their negligible potential to effect the community, it was not considered appropriate to recommend that investigations be undertaken to evaluate these emission factors.