Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Apr 20, 2006
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Apr 20, 2006 |
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Industry & Economy - Coal New tech to yield more diesel from coal? Our Bureau
Thiruvananthapuram , April 19 Chemists in the US have invented a new catalytic process that could increase the yield of a clean form of diesel made from coal. This comes at a time when the landed cost of oil soars and worries over the US dependence on foreign petroleum escalate. Coal is now becoming an increasingly attractive alternative as a feedstock to make a range of fuels. The new process, described in the current issue of the journal Science, uses a pair of catalysts to improve the yield of diesel fuel from Fischer-Tropsch (F-T) synthesis, a nearly century-old chemical technique for reacting carbon monoxide and hydrogen to make hydrocarbons.
The new process
It is by heating of coal that the mixture of gases is produced. The F-T synthesis has been known to be too expensive to compete with oil. Part of the problem is that the synthesis produces a mixture of hydrocarbons - many of which are not useful as fuel. But in the recent research, Prof Alan Goldman of Rutgers University and Prof Maurice Brookhart of the University of North Carolina used catalysts to convert these undesirable hydrocarbons into diesel.
How the catalysts work
The catalysts work by rearranging the carbon atoms, transforming six-carbon atom hydrocarbons, for example, into two and 10 carbon atom hydrocarbons. The 10-carbon version can power diesel engines. The first diesel engines that are about 30 per cent more efficient than gasoline engines. The new process is recommended as best suited for countries such as the US, which sit on a huge stockpile of coal. They can thus hope to significantly reduce their dependence on foreign oil, scientists say.
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