United States Patent: 4492772
More than a week ago, we disclosed, via report of United States Patent 2,552,308, concerning a "Low Pressure Hydrocarbon Synthesis" process, issued in 1951 to inventors in Baton Rouge, that they had known, in Louisiana, how to convert their Coal into liquid fuels for more than half a century; and, that their current Gulf Coast oil disaster was thus entirely avoidable and unnecessary - just like all the subsequent OPEC embargoes and Persian Gulf wars we, as a nation, have endured and fought since then.
British Petroleum has no plausible deniability in that regard, either, as demonstrated by the US Patent we enclose, via the above link, in this dispatch.
Comment follows excerpts from:
"United States Patent 4,492,772 - Production of Hydrocarbons by Conversion of Synthesis Gas
Date: January, 1985
Inventor: William Ball, et.al., United Kingdom
Assignee: British Petroleum, London
Abstract: An oxygenated hydrocarbon product comprising methanol and ethanol is produced by hydrogenating carbon monoxide at a temperature in the range 150 to 450 C. and a pressure in the range 1 to 700 bars in the presence as catalyst of a supported mixture of the metals rhodium, silver, zirconium and molybdenum and optionally also one or more of the metals iron, manganese, rhenium, tungsten, ruthenium, chromium, thorium and potassium. The preferred support is silica.
The present invention relates generally to the production of oxygenated hydrocarbons and in particular to a process for the production of an oxygenated hydrocarbon product comprising methanol and ethanol by the catalytic conversion of carbon monoxide and hydrogen mixtures, hereinafter to be referred to as synthesis gas.
Alcohols are gaining increasing importance as gasoline supplements and automotive fuels. In some countries there are plans for satisfying the increased demand by fermentation of natural products, e.g. molasses and beet, but worldwide there is a growing recognition of the need for an inexpensive mixed alcohols process. Potentially the catalytic conversion of synthesis gas offers just such a process. Synthesis gas can readily be obtained not only from crude oil but also from coal and methane gas which is potentially available in vast quantities."
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Although this technology is specifically directed towards the conversion of our "vast quantities" of Coal into the alcohols Ethanol and Methanol, we have many times documented that the technologies, such as the "MTG"(r), methanol-to-gasoline, process owned by ExxonMobil, exist to convert those alcohols efficiently into Gasoline.
And, note: Not only can the synthesis gas specified herein by BP be made from Coal, but also, as they itemize, from Methane, as can be synthesized via the hydro-gasification of Coal; or, by the Sabatier recycling of Carbon Dioxide, which is emitted in rather astonishing volumes by oil refineries.
Many opportunities have been lost in our failures, as a society, to follow up on such available Carbon conversion technologies. Wars in Arabia could have been avoided. Poverty in Appalachia could have been eliminated. Oceans and coastlines could have been saved.
But, as we've said before: Better late than never.