Patent US3671209
Following up on our most recent dispatch, concerning yet another US Patent, Number 2,243,869 - Method of Synthesizing Liquid Hydrocarbons, issued to the company M.W, Kellogg, now a part of Kellogg, Brown & Root, which confirms that Methane can be converted into Gasoline, we herein confirm that Methane can, indeed, be manufactured from Coal - and, other "stuff".
We enclose three United States Patents, all issued to Texaco, whose Coal gasification technology we've previously established.
The first, linked above and excerpted immediately below, relates directly to the conversion of carbonaceous resources other than Coal into Methane, as follows:
"United States Patent 3,671,209 - Garbage Disposal Process
Date: June, 1972
Inventor: Charles Teichmann, et. al., New York
Assignee: Texaco Development Corporation, NY
Abstract: Garbage and other inorganic and organic solid waste matter is (processed) with a fluid (such as) H2O ... fuel ... particulate carbon slurry ... to produce a feed mixture stream. ... (via specified processing) the garbage and solid waste matter are converted into a stream of synthesis gas ... . The invention relates to a novel process for disposing of garbage without polluting the nation's environment while producing synthesis gas and valuable by-products."
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Methane is mentioned in the above patent only as one component of the "synthesis gas", syngas, thus produced, though a major one. But, our readers should by now know what can be done with syngas, utilizing the US-patented technology invented by the Messr.'s Fischer and Tropsch, in addition to the direct liquefaction potential of Methane itself.
A year and a half after Texaco taught us how to convert garbage into Methane, and other raw materials for liquid hydrocarbon fuel synthesis, they also owned up to the fact that we could do the same thing with Coal, as in:
United States Patent: 3709669
"United States Patent 3,709,669 - Methane Production
Date: January, 1973
Inventor: Charles Marion, et. al., New York and California
Assignee: Texaco Incorporated, NY
Abstract: Process for the production of a methane-rich gas stream from a hydrocarbonaceous feedstock with all steps being carried out at or slightly above the desired pressure of delivery. Effluent gas from a free-flow partial-oxidation synthesis-gas generator, and preferably containing from about 10-26 volume percent methane on a dry basis is reacted with steam and without a catalyst at a temperature in the range of 2,800 to 1,500 degrees F to produce a stream of shifted gases having a mole ratio H.sub.2 /CO in the range of 1.5 to 4 and preferably about 3. The shifted gases are then processed by the steps of scrubbing with a liquid hydrocarbon to recover particulate carbon, cooling to condense out water and volatile hydrocarbons, purifying by eliminating H2S and CO2 in a separation zone, and catalytically reacting the remaining H2 and CO in the process gas stream to produce a process gas stream comprising at least 45 volume percent methane on a dry basis.
The process ... wherein said hydrocarbonaceous feedstock is selected from the group consisting of petroleum distillates and residua, naphtha, gas oil, residual fuel, reduced crude, whole crude, coal tar, coal oil, shale oil, tar-sand oil, and pumpable slurries of coal, particulate carbon, and petroleum coke in water or in a hydrocarbon fuel. ... (and which produces) a gaseous stream comprising about 45 to 90 mole percent of methane ... .
11. A process for producing a gaseous stream comprising about 45 to 90 mole percent of methane or higher ... ."
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There's a lot more to Patent 3709669, of course; but, that should be enough to give you the flavor of it. Then, only a few years later, Texaco felt obliged to lock up their rights to such Methane synthesis technology by filing yet another patent on related methods, as follows:
United States Patent: 3888043
"United States Patent 3,888,043 - Production of Methane
Date: June, 1975
Inventor: Edward Child, et. al., California
Assignee: Texaco Incorporated, New York
Abstract: Continuous process for the production of a gaseous stream comprising at least 90 mole % of methane (dry basis) from a sulfur containing hydrocarbonaceous fuel without polluting the environment ... . The product gas ... may be used as a substitute for natural gas or as a feedstock for organic chemical synthesis.
The process ... wherein said hydrocarbonaceous fuel is a pump-able slurry of solid carbonaceous fuels selected from the group consisting of coal, particulate carbon, petroleum cokes, concentrated sewer sludge in a vaporizable carrier such as water, liquid hydrocarbon fuel and mixtures thereof."
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Again, there seems no need to belabor the technical details published in Patent 3,888,043 and it's predecessors. For us, it seems enough that Texaco, and our expert US patent examiners, agreed that we can efficiently synthesize Methane from "coal, particulate carbon, ... concentrated sewer sludge" and plain old "garbage" - with the inclusion of "sewer sludge", specifically, suggesting what should be, among many, one obvious, though indirect, Carbon Dioxide recycling benefit inherent in these technologies.
And, yet again, once we have the Methane, we can convert it directly into liquid fuels; or, we can use it to enhance the hydrocarbon productivity of some indirect Coal conversion processes; or, we can use it to recycle more Carbon Dioxide, in the manufacture of higher hydrocarbons, via "tri-reforming" processes such as described by Penn State University.