This paper investigates the combustion characteristics of firing pure coal and firing pure wheat straw in a 150 kW swirl-stabilized burner flow reactor under nearly same conditions. The results indicate very different combustion characteristics between the coal flame and straw flame. In the straw flame, the straw particles are little affected by the swirling secondary air jet and travel in a nearly straight line through the oxygen-lean core zones. In the coal flame, most of the coal particles are strongly affected by the secondary air jet and swirled into the oxygen-rich outer radius, which also increases the residence time of coal particles. Both the factors favor a complete burnout of the coal particles. The higher volatile yields of the straw produce more off-gas, requiring more O-2 for the fast gas phase combustion and causing the off-gas to proceed to a much larger volume in the reactor prior to mixing with oxidizer. For the pulverized straw particles of a few hundred microns in diameters, the intra-particle conversion is found to be a secondary issue at most in their combustion. The simulations also show that a simple switch of the straw injection mode can not improve the burnout of the straw char. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.