Development of Carbon Products from the Waste Stream of the Super Critical Deashing Process in Coal Liquefaction

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Development of Carbon Products from the Waste Stream of the Super Critical Deashing Process in Coal Liquefaction--Fiber Materials, Inc., 5 Morin Street, Biddeford, ME 04005-4414; (207) 282-5911
Mr. Clifford Baker, Principal Investigator
Mr. David R. Audie, Business Official
DOE Grant No. DE-FG02-97ER82403
Amount: $75,000
The production of synthetic crude from coal by coal liquefaction has progressed as far as it can due to the poor economics of the process. If a small portion of the process stream could be used to produce high value added carbon products, particularly if the stream selected is a waste stream with disposal costs, the economics can be made more attractive. This project will use an aprotic solvent to dissolve the remaining organic matter from the super critical de-ashing process in coal liquefaction to produce a extracted pitch suitable for making commercially attractive carbon products. The Phase I effort will develop the solvent extraction process, characterize the resulting pitches, produce at value added carbon product, and perform a preliminary economic analysis to support further research in Phase II. Phase II will optimize the processing parameters of solvent extraction, look for additional ways to produce high value carbon products without significantly affecting the liquefaction process, and demonstrate several carbon products suitable for commercial use.

Commercial Applications and Other Benefits as described by the awardee: By increasing the value of synthetic crude processing through the use of waste streams or by adding value to other streams, the economic viability of the technology improves, resulting in a low cost, clean energy source produced from a huge domestic source of raw material. This secondary use also provides a large domestic source of raw materials for carbon products such as electrode graphite, carbon fibers, carbon foams, and carbon-carbon composites.