We've documented in a few recent reports, such as:
Federal Highway Administration Recommends Fly Ash Concrete | Research & Development;
that, Coal fly ash can be utilized as a raw material in the making of Portland-type cement, as a substitute for other minerals; and, that such use of Coal fly ash actually makes the resulting cement and concrete products stronger and more durable.
Process for the production of carbon monoxide from a solid fuel
We've extensively documented the development of a rather vast body of Coal, and other Carbon resource, conversion technology by the famous, and former, Texaco; which has since been assimilated by, and for all practical purposes disappeared into, the Chevron conglomerate.
We attempt to emphasize the importance of again demonstrating and explaining their expertise in Coal conversion science in comments, with separate links and excerpts appended, but:
Texaco's Carbon resource conversion efforts were founded originally, well more than half a century ago, on the gasification of Coal into a synthesis gas, composed primarily of Hydrogen and Carbon Monoxide, that can be catalytically condensed, as via, for one example, the long-known Fischer-Tropsch process, and be chemically transformed thereby into liquid hydrocarbons.
Boral Material Technologies : Fly Ash&CCP Management
We first call your attention to our recent dispatch, now accessible via:
Federal Highway Administration Recommends Fly Ash Concrete | Research & Development;
which included, among other items, information concerning established standards for the utilization of Coal Ash as a performance-enhancing additive for Portland-type cement, especially as cement is used as concrete in road construction and pavement.
United States Patent Application: 0110281959
We have, over the course now of years, documented for you many examples of technology being developed, by various branches of our United States Department of Defense, that would enable us to, first, economically recover Carbon Dioxide from the environment, and, then, to efficiently convert that CO2 into gaseous and liquid hydrocarbon fuels.
Such work began long ago, as we reported, for one example, in:
More US Air Force 1965 CO2 Recycling | Research & Development; concerning: "Investigation of Catalytic Reactions for CO2 Reduction; 1965; Air Force Flight Dynamics Laboratory; Abstract: Several base metal and base metal oxide CO2 reduction catalysts were selected for investigation as Part II of an in-house research program to determine catalytic effectiveness in promoting the reduction of carbon dioxide by hydrogen to methane and water."
First of all, the technology disclosed by the United States Patent which is the focus of this dispatch requires free, molecular Hydrogen to accomplish the recycling of Carbon Dioxide.
And, we wanted to get that particular point out of the way, since many might view it as an economically prohibitive drawback.
It is not.
Petroleum refineries now routinely utilize Hydrogen, especially to upgrade "heavy" crude natural petroleum, and there are well-established commercial means for producing it.
And, there are alternative means for making Hydrogen which might be of more special interest to those of us in United States Coal Country.