DD on Coal to Oil Conversion. In response to the recent PR (1-24/25-2011)
I will get more in-depth as time permits. I will also work on some more and hopefully have it posted in the we hours of the morning tomorrow before the bell.
Until then, enjoy.
Coal to Oil Conversion –
History of Coal Liquefaction
There are several methods for coal to oil conversion. I will list a them here:
Karrick process - Pyrolysis and carbonization processes: The Karrick process was invented by Lewis Cass Karrick in the 1920s.
Although Karrick did not invent coal LTC as such, he perfected the existing technologies resulting the Karrick process. The retort used for the Karrick process based on the Nevada–Texas–Utah Retort, used for the shale oil extraction.
In 1935, a Karrick LTC pilot plant was constructed in the coal research laboratory at the University of Utah. Commercial-size processing plants were operated during 1930s in Colorado, Utah and Ohio.
During the World War II, similar processing plant was operated by the United States Navy. In Australia, during the World War II the Karrick process plants were used for shale oil extraction in New South Wales.
In 1950s–1970s, the technology was used by the Rexco Company in thr Snibston plant at Coalville in Leicestershire, England.
Fischer–Tropsch process - Indirect conversion processes:
Since the invention of the original process by Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch, working at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in the 1920s, many refinements and adjustments have been made. The term "Fischer-Tropsch" now applies to a wide variety of similar processes (Fischer-Tropsch synthesis or Fischer-Tropsch chemistry).
Fischer and Tropsch filed a number of patents, e.g., US patent no. 1,746,464, applied 1926, published 1930. It was commercialized in Germany in 1936. Being petroleum-poor but coal-rich, in Germany the FT-process was used by Nazi Germany and Japan during World War II to produce ersatz (German: substitute) fuels. F-T production accounted for an estimated 9% of German war production of fuels and 25% of the automobile fuel.
The United States Bureau of Mines, in a program initiated by the Synthetic Liquid Fuels Act, employed seven Operation Paperclip synthetic fuel scientists in a Fischer-Tropsch plant in Louisiana, Missouri in 1946.
In Britain, Alfred August Aicher obtained several patents for improvements to the process in the 1930s and 1940s.[11] Aicher's company was named Synthetic Oils Ltd. (Now based in Canada.)
Bergius Process - Hydrogenation processes One of the main methods of direct conversion of coal to liquids by hydrogenation process is the Bergius process. The Bergius process was developed by Friedrich Bergius in 1913. In this process, dry coal is mixed with heavy oil recycled from the process. Catalyst is typically added to the mixture. The reaction occurs at between 400 °C (752 °F) to 5,000 °C (9,030 °F) and 20 to 70 MPa hydrogen pressure. The reaction can be summarized as follows: n C + (n + 1) H2 ? CnH2 n + 2
After World War I several plants were built in Germany; these plants were extensively used during World War II to supply Germany with fuel and lubricants.[4] The Kohleoel Process, developed in Germany by Ruhrkohle and VEBA, was used in the demonstration plant with the capacity of 200 ton of lignite per day, built in Bottrop, Germany.
This plant operated from 1981 to 1987. In this process, coal is mixed with a recycle solvent and iron catalyst. After preheating and pressurizing, H2 is added. The process takes place in a tubular reactor at the pressure of 300 bar and at the temperature of 470 °C (880 °F). This process was also explored by SASOL in South Africa.
In 1970-1980s, Japanese companies Nippon Kokan, Sumitomo Metal Industries and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries developed the NEDOL process. In this process, coal is mixed with a recycled solvent and a synthetic iron-based catalyst; after preheating H2 is added. The reaction takes place in a tubular reactor at temperature between 430 °C (810 °F) and 465 °C (870 °F) at the pressure 150-200 bar. The produced oil has low quality and requires intensive upgrading.
H-Coal process, developed by Hydrocarbon Research, Inc., in 1963, mixes pulverized coal with recycled liquids, hydrogen and catalyst in the ebullated bed reactor. Advantages of this process are that dissolution and oil upgrading are taking place in the single reactor, products have high H/C ratio, and a fast reaction time, while the main disadvantages are high gas yield (this is basically a thermal cracking process), high hydrogen consumption, and limitation of oil usage only as a boiler oil because of impurities.
The SRC-I and SRC-II (Solvent Refined Coal) processes developed by Gulf Oil and implemented as pilot plants in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s. The Nuclear Utility Services Corporation developed hydrogenation process which was patented by Wilburn C. Schroeder in 1976.
The process involved dried, pulverized coal mixed with roughly 1wt% molybdenum catalysts. Hydrogenation occurred by use of high temperature and pressure synthesis gas produced in a separate gasifier.
The process ultimately yielded a synthetic crude product, Naphtha, a limited amount of C3/C4 gas, light-medium weight liquids (C5-C10) suitable for use as fuels, small amounts of NH3 and significant amounts of CO2. Other single-stage hydrogenation processes are the Exxon Donor Solvent Process, the Imhausen High-pressure Process, and the Conoco Zinc Chloride Process.
There is also a number of two-stage direct liquefaction processes; however, after 1980s only the Catalytic Two-stage Liquefaction Process, modified from the H-Coal Process; the Liquid Solvent Extraction Process by British Coal; and the Brown Coal Liquefaction Process of Japan have been developed.
Shenhua, the Chinese coal miner, decided in 2002 to build a direct liquefaction plant in Inner Mongolia, with barrel capacity of 20 thousand barrels per day (3.2×103 m3/d). First tests were implemented at the end of 2008. A second and longer test campaign was started in October 2009.
Chevron Corporation developed a process invented by Joel W. Rosenthal called the Chevron Coal Liquefaction Process (CCLP). It is unique due the close-coupling of the non-catalytic dissolver and the catalytic hydroprocessing unit. The oil produced had properties that were unique when compared to other coal oils; it was lighter and had far fewer heteroatom impurities. The process was scaled-up to the 6 ton per day level, but not proven commercially.
“This is a new generation of C2L technology that has shown an increase in production of refined fuel per ton of coal over existing similar technologies. In addition we are able to build smaller facilities “micro plants” that will allow us to build facilities closer to regions where the product can be utilized which addresses the logistical restrictions large scale operations have to contend with. This direction will benefit all shareholders of Standard Oil Company USA. The projects will benefit North America to reduce North America's dependency on foreign oil”
Now what is the significance of all this?
Well, SOCU has claims on properties in West Virginia (18,000 acres) and Property in Kentucky.
So again, what does all this mean...? Well according to the University of Kentucky…
“Coal’s Starring Role
When I came to UK, Kentucky was going to be the Saudi Arabia of the West,” says a grinning Burt Davis. The patriarch of the Center for Applied Energy Research (CAER), Davis has spent his 30-year career at UK studying clean-fuel technology.
So why hasn’t coal broken oil’s chokehold on us? It’s a matter of efficiency, he says. “In the late ’50s, I started working for a petroleum company. When you looked at the cost—from finding the oil, pumping it out, pipelining it—you were getting 95 percent of the energy into your gas tank. It was exceptionally efficient.
Now, if you take coal, you’ve got to do a lot more work to turn it into liquid fuel. You only get 70 percent of the energy you started with into your gas tank. Today it’s still easier to pump oil out of the ground than it is to dig coal and convert that coal to liquid.
“But here’s the thing. We—Kentucky and the United States—have much more energy in the form of coal than the world does in petroleum. And we’re finding ways to increase the efficiency of coal conversion.”
How much coal does the United States have left? The American Coal Foundation estimates that nearly 300 billion tons of recoverable coal remain. In 2006, the United States produced 1.2 billion tons of coal (a 2.6 percent increase over 2005). If the growth rate of 2.6 percent per year holds, it will take 77 years to mine all 300 billion tons of coal. If the growth rate increases due to increased demand, we’ll run out sooner.
Kentucky, one of the big three coal producers along with Wyoming and West Virginia, generates more than 90 percent of the state’s electricity from coal, and more than 50 percent of the nation’s electricity is produced from coal. It’s a cheap power source, especially considering the rising cost of natural gas.
And coal has the potential to overhaul our transportation fuel infrastructure by providing emissions-free diesel. (For more on clean diesel, see “Fischer-Tropsch: A New Lease on Some Old Technology.")
AI
