Assessment of H-Coal process developments: impact on the performance and economics of a proposed commercial plant

This report assesses the performance of the H-Coal process, a catalytic direct liquefaction process, at a process development and large pilot-plant scale of operation. The assessment focused on the evaluation of operating results from selected long-term successful process development unit (PDU) and pilot plant runs made on Illinois No. 6 coal. The pilot plant has largely duplicated the product yield structure obtained during the PDU runs. Also, the quality of products, particularly liquid products, produced during the pilot plant run is quite comparable to that produced during the PDU runs. This confirms the scalability of the H-Coal ebullated-bed reactor system from a PDU-scale, 3 tons of coal per day, to a large pilot scale, 220 tons of coal per day, plant. The minor product yield differences, such as higher yields of C/sub 3/, C/sub 4/, and naphtha fractions, and lower yields of distillate oils obtained during pilot plant runs as compared to the PDU runs, will not impact the projected technical and economic performance of a first-of-a-kind commercial H-Coal plant. Thus, the process yield and operating data collected during the PDU operations provided an adequate basis for projecting the technical and economic performance of the proposed H-Coal commercial plant. 18 references, 9 figures, 56 tables