United States Patent: 4222845
The inventor named herein, Bruce Schmid, was actually employed at a Pittsburg and Midway, or P&M, (Coal) Mining Company facility in Colorado, which was a western US subsidiary, or division, of Pittsburgh, PA's Gulf Oil.
Don't be misled by apparent spelling inconsistencies. P&M Mining was originally named for, and headquartered in, Pittsburg, Kansas.
As it relates to other of our previous posts concerning the development of Coal liquefaction technologies by various corporate entities, and to others pending, keep in mind that Gulf Oil Corporation ceased to exist as an independent company in 1984, when it merged with Standard Oil of California. The new company renamed itself "Chevron".
The one claim we reproduce from the complete Patent, like the entire document, is highly complex and difficult to reduce into a clear, non-technical synopsis.
However, we are sending it along now as a prelude to some pending reports of much earlier, Consol developments of Coal liquefaction technology, which we believe this Gulf Oil innovation, in part, to be based on, or derivative of; and, prior to additional reports of Gulf's own, further, CoalTL refinements.
Additional comment follows excerpts from:
"United States Patent 4,222, 845 - Integrated Coal Liquefaction-Gasification-Naptha Reforming Process
Date; September, 1980
Inventor: Bruce Schmid, Denver, Colorado
Assignee: Gulf Oil Corporation, Pittsburgh, PA
Abstract: An integrated coal liquefaction-gasification-naphtha reforming process wherein the slurry containing substantially the entire yield of normally solid dissolved coal produced in the liquefaction zone constitutes the only hydrocarbonaceous feed for the gasification zone and wherein substantially all of the naphtha fraction produced in the liquefaction zone is passed through the reforming zone for conversion to gasoline. The cost in terms of thermal efficiency for performing the reforming step is very low when the amount of syngas produced in the gasification zone is adequate to provide upon direct combustion a considerable proportion of the fuel requirements of both the liquefaction and reformer zones.
Claim: A combination coal liquefaction-gasification-naphtha reforming process comprising passing substantially the entire raw mineral-containing feed coal for the process, hydrogen, recycle dissolved liquid solvent, recycle normally solid dissolved coal and recycle mineral residue to a coal liquefaction zone to dissolve hydrocarbonaceous material from mineral residue and to hydrocrack and hydrocarbonaceous material to produce a mixture comprising hydrocarbon gases, naphtha, dissolved liquid boiling above the naphtha boiling range, normally solid dissolved coal and suspended mineral residue; recycling to said liquefaction zone a portion of said dissolved liquid boiling above the naphtha boiling range, normally solid dissolved coal and mineral residue; separating a naphtha fraction; separating distillate liquid boiling above the naphtha range from non-recycled normally solid dissolved coal and mineral residue to produce a gasifier feed slurry; passing substantially the entire naphtha yield of said liquefaction zone through a reforming zone including heating means, a hydropretreater and a reformer for conversion to gasoline; said reforming zone producing a first hydrogen-rich stream; returning said first hydrogen-rich stream to said process for use as process hydrogen; said gasifier feed slurry comprising substantially the entire normally solid dissolved coal and mineral residue yield of said liquefaction zone substantially without normally liquid coal and hydrocarbon gases; passing said gasifier feed slurry to a gasification zone; said gasifier feed slurry comprising substantially the entire hydrocarbonaceous feed to said gasification zone; said gasification zone including an oxidation zone for the conversion of hydrocarbonaceous material to synthesis gas; converting a portion of said synthesis gas to a second hydrogen-rich stream and returning said second hydrogen-rich stream to said process for use as process hydrogen; the amount of hydrocarbonaceous material passed to said gasification zone being sufficient to enable said gasification zone to produce an additional amount of synthesis gas beyond the amount required for process hydrogen; burning said additional amount of synthesis gas or a CO fraction thereof without hydrogenative upgrading as fuel in said process; said additional amount of synthesis gas or a CO fraction thereof being sufficiently great that the efficiency of said coal liquefaction-gasification-reforming process is no more than two percentage points lower than the efficiency of the same process without the reforming step."
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In accordance with other, earlier, of our reports on other, similar, Coal conversion technologies, any Hydrogen needed for the hydrogenation of Coal can be generated as one function in the overall Coal conversion process, as in: "passing substantially the entire naphtha yield of said liquefaction zone through a reforming zone ... producing ... (in addition to "gasoline") ... a first hydrogen-rich stream; returning said first hydrogen-rich stream to said process for use as process hydrogen".
Such integral production of Hydrogen in a Coal liquefaction process is very important in terms of the overall system economy, and thus the costs of the liquid fuels produced by the process.
As we indicated above, we believe this Gulf Oil invention to be derivative of earlier, Consolidation Coal Company developments accomplished primarily by their in-house CoalTL genius, Everett Gorin. And we will, in dispatches to follow, attempt to document and explain those Consol achievements.
Further, once Chevron had acquired Gulf Oil, as earlier reported, they continued development of Gulf's Coal conversion technologies, as we will further document, utilizing Gulf's Pittsburgh-area intellectual resources.
And, soon to follow is report of another US Patent, issued immediately after the one enclosed, to Gulf, for even more refinements on the Coal liquefaction process disclosed herein.
Finally, in accordance with still other Coal conversion methods we've reported on, to achieve even greater efficiencies and economies, a portion of the intermediate Coal conversion product stream can be used as fuel within the system, to generate needed process heat, as in: "burning said additional amount of synthesis gas or a CO fraction thereof without hydrogenative upgrading as fuel in said process".
The enclosed patent, in sum, details a highly-integrated, highly-efficient process for the conversion of Coal into Gasoline, developed thirty years ago, and now owned, and still unused, by the oil industry.
We often close our dispatches by asking questions we think to be naturally, automatically, inspired by the information contained in those dispatches.
