Pursuant to our report documenting that the University of Southern California has been recently awarded a United States Patent on technology for recycling Carbon Dioxide, we wanted to affirm that, at USC, as we have earlier reported, they also know how to liquefy Coal.
Attached and enclosed is further report of their work, not on making liquid fuels from Coal, but on refining liquid fuels already made from Coal.
And, as per the enclosed and attached report, and following excerpt, they had no less than four coal-derived liquids with which to work.
The excerpt:
"PRELIMINARY EXAMINATION OF COAL LIQUEFACTION PRODUCTS
I. Schwager and T. F. Yen University of Southern California Chemical Engineering Department University Park Los Angeles. California 90007
INTRODUCTION
The three direct general processes for converting coals to liquid fuels are: catalyzed hydrogenation, staged pyrolysis, and solvent refining. Each of these processes results in the production of a coal liquid which contains a variety Of desirable and undesirable components. The desirable coal liquids are the oils-saturated and aromatic hydrocarbons plus nonpolar nonhydrocarbons, and the residual-polar non-hydrocarbons. The undesirable species are the asphaltenes and the carbenes-high molecular weight highly aromatic solids, and the carboids-polymerized coke-like materials. The undesirable elements: metals, sulfur, nitrogen, and oxygen are generally present in higher concentration in the asphaltene and carboid fractions.
Under hydrogenolysis conditions, the conversion of coal to oil has been suggested to proceed via the following sequence Coal-Asphaltene-Oil. Therefore, asphaltene generation and elimination are of great importance in the liquefaction process. A study of the chemical and physical properties of asphaltenes may lead to the discovery of ways to reduce or eliminate asphaltene build-up in coal liquids and to thereby increase the yields of desirable coal liquefaction products, In this work, coal liquids from representative liquefaction processes have been separated by solvent fractionation, and the fractions are being examined by various analytical and physical techniques. Particular attention is being directed toward asphaltene separation, purification and characterization.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A solvent fractionation scheme for separating coal liquid products into five fractions (oil, resin, asphaltene, carbene, and carboid) is shown. Representative coal liquid samples produced via the three direct coal liquefaction processes were separated into the five fractions described above. For the catalyzed hydrogenation product produced in the Synthoil process (4),the product composition is about 61% oil, 22% resin, 13% asphaltene, 0.6% carbene, and 3%carboid. The staged pyrolysis filtered product' from the FMC Corporation's COED process (5) has a product composition of about 26% oil, 48% resin, 15% asphaltene, 1%carbene and lock carboid. The solvent refined coal (SRC) produced by Catalytic Inc. based on PAMCO's SRC process affords about (? - document flawed - JtM) oil, 15% resin, 45% asphaltene, 2%carbene, and 9%carboid. The results found in this work are in good agreement with those reported recently for solvent fractionation of a Synthoil catalytic hydrogenation product, and a non-catalytic SRC product.
These workers found for a Synthoil product, 86 pentane soluble material, 15% of pentane insoluble and benzene or toluene soluble material, and 55 of benzene insoluble material, For an SRC product they found (? - document flawed.) ... 46% and 9%respectively for the above three fractions. They found their benzene insoluble fraction to be pyridine soluble, and named this fraction 'pre-asphaltenas' in the belief that it might be intermediate between coal and classical asphaltenes. We feel, however, that the benzene insoluble fractions may arise from reactive coal depolymerization moieties which are not stabilized by hydrogenation, but are repolymerized into materials more difficult to degrade than the original coal substance. More work wlll have to be done to elucidate the origin of this fraction.
SUMMARY
A preliminary examination of coal liquefaction products from four different coal liquefaction processes has been carried out. Each coal liquid has been separated into five different fractions by solvent fractionation. Total recoveries ranging from 93 to 97% by weight have been obtained. These solvent fractions are respectively: oil, resin, asphaltene, carbene, and carboid. We have further separated the asphaltene fraction by utilization of solvent elution chromatography with silica gel. into two fractions of different polarities. Unlike the asphaltene separation method described by Sternberg et al.,which gives a high chlorine content, the present method does not chemically alter the asphaltenes."
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Interestingly, we can as yet find no accurate date for this report, but will continue our research. However, their reference list, we think significantly, dates back to 1951, with several citations from the 1960's, but nothing later than 1975.
It should be growing abundantly clear, from this and from many of our earlier dispatches, that the technology for coal liquefaction, and for the refining, into liquid fuels, of coal-derived liquids, and for coal conversion in general, was being intensively developed nationwide immediately subsequent to WWII, even with the then cheap price of natural petroleum. All of those coal liquefaction technology developments, as we have previously and thoroughly noted, seemed to have been snuffed out in the late 1970's, coincident in the same time frame, we are compelled to point out, with the onset of oil supply hegemony centered on the Arabian Gulf and surrounding areas, transient gasoline shortages and dramatic gasoline price hikes.
