Coal Gasification for Hydrogen Production Using Nuclear Energy

摘要

The most abundant fossil fuel on Earth is coal. Up-to-now coal is mainly used for electricity production and will continue to play this important role in the near and mid-term. However, coal could also substitute oil and gas by coal gasification or coal liquefaction techniques. The necessary process heat could be supplied by nuclear energy to save fossil energy resources and to lower carbon emissions to the environment. In Germany, comprehensive R&D activities were conducted in the past to investigate the utilization of nuclear energy in the heat-intensive processes of coal gasification for the large-scale production of hydrogen, synthetic natural gas and synthetic liquid fuels, respectively. Different methods of gasification for the two types of coal existing in Germany have been developed, i.e. steam gasification of hard coal and hydrogasification of lignite. Both processes were successfully demonstrated on pilot plant scale under simulated nuclear conditions.