Coal is an important energy source and energy consumption in United States as well as worldwide. It will remain so for many years particularly in many developing countries. Fossil fuels stay as the main energy sources to the U.S. economy, but we can not ignore the importance of coal for decades. Coal production provides the price stability and will continue to be an significant source for electricity generation. Coal utilization is the major source of hydrogen in the coming hydrogen-based energy economy and it will be a crucial source of gas to liquid process of fuels energy.
Coal utilization and the importance of coal as source of energy industry perspective will change over time. Some concerns for environmental implications of coal utilization will be replaced by an improved methods for controlling and reducing coal emissions during coal gasification process. Researches also play a significant role in producing more efficient coal utilization, especially in non-traditional sectors which occupy direct combustion methods. But the economic importance of coal still the main reasons why it is still considered the major source of energy.
The barriers to implement a more environmental-friendly coal utilization technologies are the financial risks associated with this technologies. Reducing environmental impact on coal production are further causing higher costs of energy to the consumers. Consumers in the US have become accustomed to low domestic energy prices and have unwillingness to pay more for the energy source for daily activities like vehicles, natural gas for domestic heating, and electricity for their homes. Consumer have the decision on their hand to choose between environmental source of energy or cheap energy.
The importance of coal to US economy at the local level and worldwide is obvious. For example, from a coal mining environment n North Dakota, we see the importance of energy, mining, power generation, coalbed methane production. There were five mines, seven power plants and a coal gasification plant located just within a radius of 100 miles from Beulah, North Dakota. We realized the economic importance of coal to larger regions, such as the state of North Dakota, other states of coal in the US and the world. Coal production is widely dispersed around the world, as opposed to oil and gas which is more concentrated in nature . Most countries (with the exception of some countries of the Middle East) contains coal reserves. Therefore this coal reserves granting those countries the possibility of self-sufficient energy or at least offer choices to use domestic energy resources rather than import energy from abroad.
Coal Gasification
Coal gasification further produce syngas, it is a mixture of H2 (hydrogen) and CO (carbon monoxide). Syngas can then be converted into fuels which can be used as transportation fuels like gasoline and diesel. The converted process of syngas is known as Fischer-Tropsch process. The process can be used to make gasoline from coal and natural gas. On the other hand, hydrogen can be obtained as a result of coal gasification. The wide purposes of hydrogen that can be utilized for several functions such as powering a hydrogen economy, making ammonia, or upgrading fossil fuels, make coal gasification will be important in the future.
Coal Definition
A broad and accurate coal definition according to Van Krevelen “Coal is a rock, a sediment, a conglomerate, a living biological fossil, a complex colloidal system, a mystery in a solid state physics and fascinating subject of chemical and physical analysis.” Briefly, coal definition is a physically and chemically “combustible,” sedimentary rock comprising of organic and inorganic materials. In organically material, coal is mainly carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and lesser amounts of sulfur and nitrogen. In inorganically material, it consisted of range of ash-forming compounds distributed throughout the coal. Inorganic compounds of coal have the concentration of several percent to parts per billion of deposits of coal.
Coal Deposits and Coal Seams
In coal deposits form, it is also known as coal seams as a result of vegetation accumulation that has undergone physical and chemical changes over time. These include the dismantling of vegetation, the deposition and burial of sedimentation, compaction, and the process of transformation of plant organic remains found in rock.
The formation process of majority of the coal can be explained by process in which coal deposits are not easily explicated by this model. Some coals have been strengthened by the accumulation of vegetal material transported by water. Fragments of plants, which have been transported and deposited on the bottom of sea or lakes, then become compressed into rock.
Coal deposits are mostly shaped in some geological period. It started since Carboniferious Period, about 300 to 250 millions years ago.
