Experiments have been performed on 1 MW pulverized coal (pc) furnace in order to investigate the characteristics of coal combustion and NOx emission from a new type of radially biased dual register whirl burner. The burner is characterized by a primary air pipe with a continuously changing cross-section and an impact ring. The mixture of pulverized coal and air inside the primary pipe is split into two streams, which are the outer pc rich annular jet and the inner pc lean annular jet respectively. Three Chinese coals, which are high rank bituminous coal, low rank bituminous coal and meager coal respectively, are used in the experiments. We examine the influences of various parameters such as the relative position of the over-fire air (OFA) nozzle, over-fire air ratio (19.1%), primary air ratio, inner secondary air ratio. outer secondary air ratio, inner secondary air swirling intensity, and outer secondary air swirling intensity on NOx formation and unburned carbon in fly ash. With the primary air ratio increasing from 13.4% to 23.4%, the value of the NOx emission of the SH coal decreases by 26.7% at first, and then increases by 21.7%. In contrast, the value of the carbon in fly ash (C-FA) increases by 40.1% at first, and then decreases by 58.3%. According to the experimental results, the influence of each individual parameter on NOx formation and unburned carbon in fly ash agrees well with the existing literature. In this study, the influences of various combinations of these parameters are also examined, thus providing some reference for the design of the radial biased whirl burner, the configuration of the furnace and the distribution of the air. Crown Copyright (C) 2009 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.