Coal-based synfuels

The production of domestic sulfur values (elemental recovered sulfur and the sulfur content of acid) will total about 18 million long tons per year by the year 2000. By region (Petroleum Administration for Defense districts), except for the east coast (PAD I), there will be no deficit areas in the U. S. Major contributors are sour natural gas and the refining of heavier, sour, crude oil. Proximate, scenario dependent sources, are electric utilities and coal-based synfuels. Shale oil, domestic tar sands and heavy oil, and unconventional sources of natural gas will be small suppliers. 

In the new efforts to develop a synfuel industry based on synthesis gas from coal the slurry type reactors play a dominant role. For instance, a bubble column slurry reactor was mainly applied in a recent comparative study of various catalysts carried out in Germany. In the US, several pilot plants for syngas conversion processes are under construction which make use of the advantages of the slurry technology. 

In recent years, the development of FTS in China gained extensive attention. In 1997, Institute of Coal Chemistry developed two kinds of catalysts which based on precipitation of iron ICCI and ICCII. In 2006, the low-temperature iron series catalyst and slurry bed FTS technology were developed by the Institute of Coal Chemistry and Synfuels China. And then, three synthetic oil pilot plants were started to be estabhshed, which are the scale of 160-180 thousand tons of oH/z. These plants have been started to operate in March 2010. 

The Mobil methanol-to- oline (MTG) process is one of two current commercial technologies for producing synthetic fluid fuels from synthesis Until 1985, the sole "synfuel" process in commercial practice was the Sasol Process (in South Africa), which is based on classic Fischer-Tropsch chemistry and utilizes coal-derived synthesis The Sasol process produces a wide range of aliphatic hydrocarbon... 

The South Africans have applied the Fischer-Tropsch technology in their SASOL facility. The Sasol (South African Coal, Oil and Gas Corporation) installation is the world s largest synfuel plant based on coal. It converts an inferior high-ash (35%) coal into a broad spectrum of products, which may include ethylene, propylene, butylene, gasoline, and long straight-chain alcohols and hydrocarbons. The Sasol plant has been operating for over 35 years. 

---