Ikelic - Alliance Digital Repository

STATUS OF COAL PROJECTS (Underline denotes changes since June 1994)
COMMERCIAL AND R&D PROJECTS (Continued)
The development was started at the "Institut fur Eisenhuttenkunde"
of Aachen Technical University in an ambient pressure process
development unit (PDU) of about 50 kilograms per hour coal throughput.
Based on the results of pre-tests with this PDU a pilot plant, operating at pressure of 10 bar was built in July 1978 at the
Wachtberg plant site near Cologne. Following an expansion in 1980/1981, feed rate was doubled to 1.3 tons per hour dry lignite.
end of June 1985 the test program was finished and the plant was shut down. From 1978 until June 1985 about 21,000 tons of
By
dried brown coal were processed in about 38,000 hours of operation. The specific synthesis gas yield reached 1380 standard cubic
meters per ton of brown coal (MAF) corresponding to 96 percent of the calculated value. thermodynamically At feed rates of
about 1,800 kilograms per hour coal, the synthesis gas output of more than 7,700 standard cubic meters per hour per square meter
of gasifier area was more than threefold the values of atmospheric Winkler gasifiers. The pilot plant was shut down in mid-1985.
After gasification tests with Finnish peat in the HTW pilot plant in the spring of 1984 the Kemira Oy Company of Finland decided
to convert an existing ammonia production plant at Oulu from heavy oil to peat gasification according to the HTW process. The
plant was designed to gasify approximately 650 tons per day of peat at 10 bar and process it to 280 tons per day of ammonia. This
plant started up in 1988.
Rheinbraun constructed a 30 ton per hour demonstration plant for the production of 300 million cubic meters of syngas per year.
All engineering for gasifier and gas after-treatment including water scrubber, shift conversion, gas clean up and sulfur recovery was
performed by Uhde; Linde AG is contractor for the Rectisol gas cleanup. The synthesis gas produced at the site of Rheinbraun's
Ville/Berrenrath briquetting plant is pipelined to DEA-Union Kraftstoff for methanol production. From startup in January 1986
until November 1994 about 1.2 billion tons of dried brown coal were processed in about 54.600 hours of operation. During this
time, about 1.6 billion cubic meters of synthesis gas were produced.
A new pilot plant, called pressurized HTW gasification plant, for pressures up to 25 bar and throughputs up to 63 tons per hour
was erected on the site of the former pilot plant of hydrogasification and started up in November 1989. From mid-November 1989
to early July 1990, the plant was operated at pressures between 10 and 25 bar, using oxygen as the gasifying agent. Significant fea
tures of the 25 bar gasification are the high specific coal throughput and, consequently, the high specific fuel gas flow of almost
100 MW per square meter. In mid-1990, the 25 bar HTW plant was modified to permit tests using air as the gasifying agent. Until
the end of January 1992 the plant was operated for 8,753 hours at pressures of up to 25 bar, oxygen blown as well as air blown.
Under all test and operating conditions gasification was uniform and trouble free.
Typical results obtained are: up to 95 percent coal conversion, over 70 percent cold-gas efficiency and 50 MW specific fuel gas
flow per square meter air blown and 79 percent cold-gas efficiency and 105 MW specific fuel gas flow per square meter oxygen
*
blown.
From February to September 1992 tests with a German hard coal and with Pittsburgh No. 8 coal were successfully performed in the
pressurized HTW gasification plant using oxygen and air as gasification agents as well. Within 543 hours of operation 728 tons of
hard coal were processed. The pressurized HTW gasification plant was shut down in November 1992.
This work is performed in close co-ordination with Rheinbraun's sister company, RWE Energie AG. which operates power stations
of a capacity of some 9,300 megawatts on the basis of lignite. Since this generating capacity will have to be renewed after the turn
of the century, it is intended to develop the IGCC technology so as to have a process available for the new powerplants. Based on
the results of these tests and on the experience gained with operating the HTW pressurized plant, a demonstration plant for in
tegrated HTW gasification combined cycle (HTW-IGCC) power generation is planned with a capacity of 300 MW of electric power.
The gas will be produced in one air-blown gasifier. See KOBRA HTW-IGCC Project (C-294).
Project Cost: Not disclosed
- SASOL Sasol Limited (C-490)
Sasol Limited is the holding company of the multi divisional Sasol Group of Companies. Sasol is a world leader in the commercial
production of coal based synthetic fuels. The Synthol oil-from-coal process was developed by Sasol in South Africa in the course of
more than 30 years. A unique process in the field, its commercial-scale viability has been fully proven and its economic viability
conclusively demonstrated.
The first Sasol plant was established in Sasolburg in the early fifties. The much larger Sasol Two and Three plants, at Secunda-
situated on the Eastern Highveld of Transvaal, came on-stream in 1980 and 1982, respectively.
The two Secunda plants are virtually identical and both are much larger than Sasol One, which served as their prototype. Enor
mous quantities of feedstock are produced at these plants. At full production, their daily consumption of coal is almost
100,000 tons, of oxygen, 28,000 tons; and of water, 250 megaliters. Sasol's facilities at Secunda for the production of oxygen are by
far the largest in the world.
Facilities at the fuel plants include boiler houses, Lurgi coal gasifiers, oxygen plants, Rectisol gas purification units, synthol reac
tors, gas reformers and refineries. Hydrocarbon synthesis takes place means by of the Sasol licensed Synthol process.
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SYNTHETIC FUELS REPORT, JANUARY 1995