Microbial Conversions of Low Rank Coals - Nature Biotechnology
To further validate the substance of Joe's WVU research in the early Seventies, into the microbial conversion of carbonaceous coal mine wastes and low rank coals, and of Craig Venter's much more current research into carbon-converting microbes, we submit the enclosed from our own, US, Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Comment follows: (And, note: We are including this report's rather substantial list of documentation. The point of that being: Joe's WVU research, Craig Venter's current interests and this subject article are not isolated, speculative intellectual excursions. Just as very real, though deliberately-obscured, technologies exist which can convert coal into liquid fuels and chemicals, equally-obscured biotechnologies exist which would enable us, in a "green" way, to utilize low-rank, otherwise uneconomical coal deposits, and some coal mine refuse accumulations, to produce liquid fuels.
The excerpt, with additional comment following the extensive reference list:
"Microbial Conversions of Low Rank Coals
Brendlyn D. Faison
Chemical Technology Division, and Environmental Sciences Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN 37831.
Coal is the United States' most abundant nonrenewable energy resource. However, the quality of many coals is too low to offset the practical, economic, and regulatory barriers to their utilization. A variety of bacterial and fungal species have been shown to attack low rank (i.e., low-quality) coals. Technologies based on these microbial activities may be useful for the conversion of these coals to more useful products, including high-quality fuels and chemicals. Substantial developmental work will be required in order for these microbial processes to become competitive with nonbiological processes. This review summarizes the microbiological and biochemical principles underlying microbial coal conversion as a basis for predicting the practical utility of coal bio-processes.
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We can, it seems, use bio-technology to convert some coal mine wastes, and low-rank coals, into liquid fuels; a concept which should appeal to the evergreen corn ethanol crowd, who would rather see us fill up our fuel tanks with our food supply, but who might be mollified to see us, instead, cleaning up some of our coal mine refuse piles to manufacture liquid fuels in an economical, ecological, all-natural way.