United States Patent: 4235699
It's beginning to seem as if, at one time, anyone who was anyone in the community of United States Chemical and Petroleum companies knew how to convert Coal into liquids suitable for refining into fuels and organic chemicals of commercial utility.
Herein, in their United States Patent on Coal liquefaction technology, the old Allied Chemical Company, which became a part of Honeywell in 1999, if you recall our previous dispatches about Honeywell's Coal conversion achievements in concert with their UOP - United Oil Products - Division, presents an interesting, even intriguing, take on Coal conversion processes.
As you will see, they utilize products easily derived from, especially high Sulfur, Coal as agents of dissolution in their liquefaction technique.
Comments are appended to our excerpts from the linked and attached files of:
"United States Patent 4,235,699 - Solubilization of Coal with Hydrogen Sulfide and Carbon Monoxide
November 25, 1980
Inventors: Charles Ratcliffe and Mahmoud Abdel-Baset; NJ
Assignee: Allied Chemical Corporation; Morris, NJ
Abstract: Conversion of coal to products soluble in common solvents and conversion of coal tar to products of lower molecular weight, effected in liquid or fused reaction medium using a hydrogenating reactant, are carried out employing hydrogen sulfide and carbon monoxide as the sole or major hydrogenating reactant, without need of elemental hydrogen or a hydrogen donor solvent.
Background: This invention relates to the conversion of coal and/or coal tar to products of lower molecular weight than the starting material and soluble in solvents such as ethyl acetate, benzene and other common solvents.
Prior Art: It is generally known in the coal liquefaction art, to mix pulverized coal with a hydrogen donor solvent such as a fraction of recycled oil produced in the process. ... It would be desirable to provide a method to hydrogenate and thus solubilize coal without use of elemental hydrogen either directly in the process, or for rehydrogenating a hydrogen donor solvent.
Summary: There is a need for efficient and economical reagents for the hydrogenation and solubilization of coal and coal tar, as above. In accordance with this invention, the solubilization of coal and conversion of coal tar to products of lower molecular weight, effected in liquid or fused medium using a hydrogenation reactant, are carried out employing reactant consisting essentially of hydrogen sulfide and carbon monoxide as the sole or major hydrogenating reactant, without need of elemental hydrogen or a hydrogen donor solvent. Specifically, conversion of ... coal to products soluble in ethyl acetate is accomplished using a hydrogenating agent which consists essentially of hydrogen sulfide and carbon monoxide."
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First, we find it intriguing that someone supposedly informed could say something like "It is generally known in the coal liquefaction art".
Regardless: Thirty years ago, a New Jersey company did know how to convert Coal into liquid hydrocarbons using what are essentially, the potential by-products of some coal combustion processes: hydrogen sulfide and carbon monoxide.
Truth to tell, if we read the full patent details correctly, there remains, from this process, a fairly large percentage of carbonaceous residue. That is true of many Coal conversion processes, but a variety of technologies exist, and have been, as we've documented, reduced to practice, which enable the extraction of further hydrocarbon values from such "resid" left by primary processes of Coal conversion. In fact, we refer you to one of our more recent reports, detailing "United States Patent 2,634,286 - Production of Hydrocarbon Synthesis Gas from Coal; April 7, 1953", which explains one such technology for the secondary conversion of residues resulting from primary Coal liquefaction processes.
In that patent, the inventors, the old Esso R&D group, apparently anticipated, very nearly six decades ago, Allied Chemical's need for such technology three decades later.
