Synthetic

fuels
100
(2015)01-04
01Synthetic
fuels
1(2015)

Synthetic fuels

Coal Gasifiers: Coal gasifying technology

Nhambe Oupa
*

School of Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3,Wits, 2050, South Africa

1. Introduction
1.1. Background of coal gasification
Gasification is a thermochemical process that converts carbonaceous materials,
such as biomass and fossil fuels; into mixture containing mostly hydrogen and
carbon monoxide (synthesis gas) in the presence of oxygen, steam and carbon
dioxide. Coal gasification has been in existence for over 200 years. London saw the
first use of coal gas for gas lights in the late 1700s, and coal gas was later used for
fuel in Europe and North America in the 19 th and early 20th century. During the
second World-War Germany used coal derived fuels for transportation (Rubin, 2006;
Breault, 2010).
Lower cost natural gas and oil replaced coal gas as a fuel source after the second
World-War except for South Africa and some developing countries. This was until the
first oil crisis in 1973. Using oil as a fuel source was now not economical compared
to coal gasification. A number of coal gasification processes had been developed
ever since. Coal gasification technology was developed to meet liquid and gaseous
fuels demand and to also to develop advanced power generation technologies (Sha,
1995). Depending on gasifier type and the conditions at which it operates gasification
can be employed to produce a fuel suitable for various applications (Shandle et al.,
2002).
1.2 Chemistry of Coal gasification
There are two major steps involved in gasification, i.e. de-volatilization followed by
gasification. De-volatilization is similar to pyrolysis and occurs rapidly at
temperatures above 4000C. During this step the coal structure is changed, solid char,
tars, condensable liquids and light gases are produced. The amount of the devolatilization gas that condenses at room temperature is known as char. The
incondensable de-volatilization gas at room temperature and pressure is composed
mainly CO, CO2, CH4 and H2O. After de-volatilization char is left behind. The char is
gasified at low rates (Sha, 1995; Shandle et al., 2002).

1.2.1 Coal gasification reactions

The main product coal gasification is synthetic gas, which is a mixture of carbon monoxide
and hydrogen gas. Not all the carbon in the coal is oxidized, only a portion is oxidized.
According to Shandle et al. (2002) the following takes place during the gasification
process:

( 1+ ) C+ O2 2CO+ ( 1 ) CO 2( 1)

ranges from 0 (pure carbon dioxide) to 1 (pure carbon monoxide)

The char is slowly converted with CO 2, H2O and H2 through the slower reversible
gasification reactions:
C+CO 2 2 CO ( 2 )
C+ H 2 O CO+ H 2 ( 3 )
C+2 H 2 CH 4 ( 4 )
The char properties and the gasification conditions determine the rate of the gasification
reactions.
Another very important reaction that occurs is the water-gas shift reaction:
CO+H 2 O CO 2+ H 2 ( 5 )
1.2.2 Coal gasification products
The syngas produced from the gasification chamber can be further processed to produce
a number of chemical products. The products produced include ammonia for fertilizer
production, methanol for a number of applications, conventional transportation fuels,
power generation (IGCC) (Bowen & Irwin, 2006; Maurstad et al., 2005).
1.3 Types of coal gasifiers
The major process techniques for coal gasification can be classified into three: (1) fluidized
bed reactors- back mixed; (2) moving bed reactors- counter current flow; (3) entrained flow
reactors- not back mixed. In moving-bed gasifier the coal is moving in a downwards
direction and is contacted by an upward counter current flow of gas, the coal within the
reactor undergoes 5 temperature profile stages: drying, de-volatilization, gasification,
combustion and ash cooling in consecutive manner (Kent, 2010).
1.3.2 Moving bed gasifier
The moving bed has been termed to be the most efficient technique of transforming
carbonaceous fuels to fuel gas (Shadle, et al., 2002). In the drying zone coal is dried,
preheated and hydrocarbons which are volatile are removed. In the gasification zone its
where steam and carbon dioxide react with hot char to form hydrogen and carbon

monoxide (Kent, 2010). In the oxidation zone heat for gasification is manufactured when
oxygen reacts with residual carbon. Moving beds have a number of advantages such as
heat maximum economy, high carbon conversion ( Hobbs, et al., 1992). It should be noted
that moving bed gasifiers are developed in such a way that they can withstand different
types of solid fuels.
The factors that affect fuel performance dearly in moving bed gasifiers are size distribution
and particle size, the likelihood for formation of an agglomerated mass due to coal melting
(Shadle, et al., 2002). The drawbacks of moving bed gasifiers are that they are not able to
process caking coals. The reason for such is because the coal has likelihood to
agglomerate and swell upon heating resulting in faulty distribution of both gas and solids
leading to process failure ( Bell, et al., 2010). The fouling of gas pipelines due to tar
production in the heating zone when gas is used as a chemical feedstock. Coals that have
moisture content more than 35% are not suitable feedstock for moving bed as they lose
strength when heated. (Shadle, et al., 2002).
1.3.3 Fluidized bed gasifier
The fluidized bed gasifiers emerged in the 1930s as a different approach to move away
from size limitation and lacking fuel flexibility encountered in the early moving bed gasifier (
Hobbs, et al., 1992). The design of the reactor vessel was such that the steam and air flow
needed for gasification was adequate to fluidize the bed of ash, char and coal (Shadle, et
al., 2002). Fluidization results when bed particles are lifted by the gas flow allowing the
gas-solid system to behave as fluid. It should however be noted that the coal feed to this
gasifiers is finer uniformly crushed unlike the larger coal particles used in moving bed
gasifier (Shadle, et al., 2002).
The advantages for these types of gasifiers are that mixing is better and provide uniform
temperatures that promote de-volatilization products to react with oxygen ( Bell, et al.,
2010). In dry fluidized beds the temperature has to be kept under the ash melting point,
this results to incomplete conversion of carbon for non-reactive coals. However the main
advantage of the fluid bed gasifiers is the use of low quality coal containing high ash
content as well as caking coals. The one disadvantage is the high temperature of the fuel
gas exiting the reactor which results from good mixing in the fluid bed gasifiers. Thus this
causes process inefficiency when gas clean-up is utilized. Solids particles trapped within
the product fuel are carbon rich showing coal that did not react, which must be recovered.
(Shadle, et al., 2002).
1.3.4 Entrained flow gasifier
The entrained flow gasifiers history of development is similar to fluidized beds since it was
evolved to increase the fuel gas production rate and allow its operation to be with a wide
feedstock range ( Bell, et al., 2010). In the entrained flow gasifier crushed coal is entrained
with gas medium co-currently under high temperature flame (Miller, 2005). This gasifier
typically has low residence time, utilizes its oxidant as oxygen and has high operational
temperatures which are above ash-slag conditions, resulting in high conversion of carbon
to hydrogen, carbon monoxide and with no tars, oils, or phenols ( Bell, et al., 2010).

This makes this type of gasifier to have a large throughput and capacity compared to other
gasifiers. The characteristics of entrained flow gasifier are that it has the ability to gasify
all types of coal, but generally coals with low ash are highly preferred (Miller, 2005).
1.4 Types of Gasification
There are different types of gasification processes these include underground coal
gasification (UCG), Integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC), pressurised fluidised
bed combustion (PFBC), low emission boiler system (LEBS) and high performance power
system (HPPS) (Topper, Cross & Goldthorpe; 1994). The underground coal gasification is
combination of gasification, mining and exploitation thus the actual mining and the
conversion of coal to products is achieved in a single step. The production of synthetic gas
from UCG is relatively cheaper compared to other gasification processes (Gregg, 1978).
1.4.1 Integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC)
The integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) is a process that converts coal to
synthetic gas and the gas is then used in the production of electricity in the combined cycle
process, which includes the gas turbine and the heat recovery steam generator
(Maurstad,2005).According to (Gao, Jin, Liu, Zheng, 2004) production of electricity can be
accompanied by the production of methanol. This is achieved by splitting the syngas
produced after gasification; thus some is used in electricity production and some in
methanol production. This process is known as poly-generation and it is more efficient and
cleaner than individual processes.
1.4.2 Pressure fluidised bed combustion (PFBC)
Pressurised fluidised bed combustion (PFBC) involves the burning of coal at very high
temperatures and steam is then produced within the in-bed tubes and its expanded in the
steam turbines, the pressurised hot gas (800 0-8500C) is expanded and cleaned in gas
turbine were power is generated . This is clean technology as syngas is the product which
can be further processed to different products (Basu, Prabir, 2006).

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