Coal To Liquid

It is certain that there is no person who does not know that there are three main types of sources of energy. Those are: solid sources of energy (such as coal, wood and other fossils); liquid sources of energy (oil is a typical example); and gas sources of energy (like the methane for example). It would be unneeded to say that each of them has its own advantages and drawbacks.

For example, a disadvantage of the oil is that we have become too dependant on it and we are expected to run out of it within a century or two. But when talking about the coal (a solid source of energy), we need to conform to its limited appliances. To sum up, we have good storages of coal but we do not need it so much whereas we will run out of, undoubtedly, the most important source of energy on the planet- the oil!

Fortunately, there is a method called ‘coal to liquid’. Do not worry if you have not heard of it or do not know what it is. Basically, it should not be difficult to come up with the correct statement: it is a process of converting the solid coal fossils into liquid oil. You think that it sounds like a magic, don’t you?

However, the truth is that it is completely possible and there is even not one but two ways of converting coal to liquid. The first one is called ‘direct converting’ which involves the dissolution of coal under high pressure and temperature. The direct converting is considered to be very effective but it is important to mention that the liquid after the process always needs further refining so that good quality of the oil is achieved. The other way for converting coal to liquid is the so called ‘indirect converting’. The coal is gasified (syngas) and then the syngas is liquefied. The oil produced by indirect converting is of extremely high quality and does not need refining.

That was pretty much everything which could be mentioned about the ‘coal to liquid’ method. It is obvious that it has got many advantages and it is a great discovery which will allow us to produce oil by a source which the earth is abundant with. What could be better than that? It means that even when we run out of petrol one day, we will be able to produce it by other resources. For now, it could be manufactured only by coal but who knows what will happen in the future!

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