Black Gold ?
The start of the month is always so bare on Blog MyyyyyAsssss. Go over to the Archive Section to the side and
see what was posted in November - you may be missing something you would like to read.
Tuesday, 29 November 2005
Coal: The Gas Gold Mine
Forget hydrogen for now, we may dig our way out of our foreign oil dependency. A technology for turning coal into liquid fuel that has been kept underground for decades is slowly becoming commercialized.
Syntroleum and Rentech Development are among several companies refining the Fischer-Tropsch process for turning coal into diesel fuel. The process super heats coal to release a gas, which is then cooled and turned into a liquid. Fischer-Tropsch was developed in the 1920's in Germany, and the country used synthetic diesel during WWII to fuel planes.
According to one estimate, the United States has a coal reserve of 500 billion tons which could be converted to more fuel than is in all of the world's petroleum reserves.
Several small-scale plants are now converting natural gas and coal to diesel, and the federal government is providing financial support through FutureGen grants. With rising oil prices and diminishing supplies, you'll be seeing a lot more about Fischer-Tropsch in the coming years, especially in coal rich states.
More on Black Gold here.
Black Gold
From Wired:Tuesday, 29 November 2005
Coal: The Gas Gold Mine
Forget hydrogen for now, we may dig our way out of our foreign oil dependency. A technology for turning coal into liquid fuel that has been kept underground for decades is slowly becoming commercialized.
Syntroleum and Rentech Development are among several companies refining the Fischer-Tropsch process for turning coal into diesel fuel. The process super heats coal to release a gas, which is then cooled and turned into a liquid. Fischer-Tropsch was developed in the 1920's in Germany, and the country used synthetic diesel during WWII to fuel planes.
According to one estimate, the United States has a coal reserve of 500 billion tons which could be converted to more fuel than is in all of the world's petroleum reserves.
Several small-scale plants are now converting natural gas and coal to diesel, and the federal government is providing financial support through FutureGen grants. With rising oil prices and diminishing supplies, you'll be seeing a lot more about Fischer-Tropsch in the coming years, especially in coal rich states.
More on Black Gold here.