Coal is the most important primary energy source in China. Traditionally, coal is mainly used to provide electricity, chemical fertilizer, cement and other chemicals. Recently, coal has been expected to be the raw materials for producing substitutes of petroleum oil products, such as motor fuels, chemicals etc. in order to meet the increasing market demand. The technologies which can convert coal into value-added fuels and chemicals in more efficient ways have been required by the industry. The government, industrial companies, research institutes and universities have been engaging in the technology development and deployment. Some of the technologies are introduced in present report:1.     Fe-based FT synthesis: This technology uses Fe based catalyst and slurry bubble column reactor for production of clean diesel. The technology has been demonstrated in three industrial plants with capacity of 160 000 t/a for each. Two commercial plants with capacity of 4 mt/a and 1.8 mt/a are now under construction.2.     Co-based FT synthesis: Co based catalyst has been developed for diesel and chemical production using tubular reactor. After pilot plant test, a 100 000 t/a plant is under design. The main products of the plant will be value added chemicals.3.     Methanol conversion to gasoline: This technology is also known as MTG, originally developed by Exxon. The new process uses one reactor and modified ZSM-5 catalyst rather than two reactors for methanol to DME, and DME to gasoline. A commercial plant with capacity of 200 000 t/a is under construction in Yunnan Province, which uses brown coal as raw materials.4.     Methanol conversion to light olefins: DMTO technology has been in commercial production in Shenhua Group since 2009. The capacity of the plant is 600 000 t/a. This is the first industrial plant of MTO technology in the world.5.     Coal based ethylene glycol production: This technology is also commercialized. The first plant was built and started in operation in 2009 with capacity of 200 000 t/a.

Technology development and deployment of clean coal conversion to fuels and chemicals in China

248th National Meeting (2014)

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