Option for the Coal Industry in Utilizing Fossil Fuel Resources with Reduced CO2 Emissions: Revision.

摘要

We developed a process for separating the hydrogen from the carbon in the coal, and disposing of the oxygen and the small amounts of sulfur and nitrogen and the ash as inert material. The process produces carbon black. It is presently and has for a long time been produced from residual oil and gas. Our carbon from coal process is called HYDROCARB. It is based on two well-known chemical reactions. The first reaction involves the hydrogenation of coal to form methane gas, and the second reaction thermally decomposes the methane to carbon black and hydrogen, part of which is recycled. In this cyclical process, there is no need for additional hydrogen, but rather hydrogen is produced as a co-product. The small amount of oxygen in the coal is removed either as water or as CO2. Carbon black can be burned in a clean manner in stationary power plants or when mixed with water, gasoline, oil or even methanol, it can be pumped as a liquid mix which can be burned in diesel engines, turbines and even in internal combustion engines. Since it does not contain any ash, sulfur or nitrogen, it burns cleanly; the only product being CO2. However, the HYDROCARB Process is very efficient requiring a very small net amount of energy, much less than any coal gasification or liquefaction process. Thus, much less total CO2 will be formed when burning carbon black than burning the inefficient coal-derived synthetic hydrocarbon fuels. 11 refs., 1 fig., 5 tabs.