Scoping Studies to Evaluate the Benefits of an Advanced Dry Feed System on the Use of Low-Rank Coal

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rader, Jeff; Aguilar, Kelly; Aldred, Derek

2012-03-30

The purpose of this project was to evaluate the ability of advanced low rank coal gasification technology to cause a significant reduction in the COE for IGCC power plants with 90% carbon capture and sequestration compared with the COE for similarly configured IGCC plants using conventional low rank coal gasification technology. GE’s advanced low rank coal gasification technology uses the Posimetric Feed System, a new dry coal feed system based on GE’s proprietary Posimetric Feeder. In order to demonstrate the performance and economic benefits of the Posimetric Feeder in lowering the cost of low rank coal-fired IGCC power with carbonmore » capture, two case studies were completed. In the Base Case, the gasifier was fed a dilute slurry of Montana Rosebud PRB coal using GE’s conventional slurry feed system. In the Advanced Technology Case, the slurry feed system was replaced with the Posimetric Feed system. The process configurations of both cases were kept the same, to the extent possible, in order to highlight the benefit of substituting the Posimetric Feed System for the slurry feed system.« less

Anaerobic bioprocessing of low-rank coals. [Veillonella alcalescens and Propionibacterium acidipropionici

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jain, M.K.; Narayan, R.; Han, O.

1992-01-30

The overall goal of this project is to find biological methods to remove carboxylic functionalities from low-rank coals under ambient conditions and to assess the properties of these modified coals towards coal liquefaction. The main objectives of this quarter were: (1) continuation of microbial consortia development, (2) evaluation of the isolated organisms for decarboxylation, (3) selection of best performing culture (known cultures vs. new isolates), and (4) coal decarboxylation using activated carbon as blanks. The project began on September 12, 1990.

Degradation of low rank coal by Trichoderma atroviride ES11.

PubMed

Silva-Stenico, M Estela; Vengadajellum, Caryn J; Janjua, Hussnain A; Harrison, Sue T L; Burton, Stephanie G; Cowan, Don A

2007-09-01

A new isolate of Trichoderma atroviride has been shown to grow on low rank coal as the sole carbon source. T. atroviride ES11 degrades approximately 82% of particulate coal (10 g l(-1)) over a period of 21 days with 50% reduction in 6 days. Glucose (5 g l(-1)) as a supplemented carbon source enhanced the coal solubilisation efficiency of T. atroviride ES11, while 10 and 20 g l(-1) glucose decrease coal solubilisation efficiency. Addition of nitrogen [1 g l(-1) (NH(4))(2)SO(4)] to the medium also increased the coal solubilisation efficiency of T. atroviride ES11. Assay results from coal-free and coal-supplemented cultures suggested that several intracellular enzymes are possibly involved in coal depolymerisation processes some of which are constitutive (phenol hydroxylase) and others that were activated or induced in the presence of coal (2,3-dihydrobiphenyl-2,3-diol dehydrogenase, 3,4-dihydro phenanthrene-3,4-diol dehydrogenase, 1,2-dihydro-1,2-dihydroxynaphthalene dehydrogenase, 1,2-dihydro-1,2-dihydroxyanthracene dehydrogenase). GC-MS analysis of chloroform extracts obtained from coal degrading T. atroviride ES11 cultures showed the formation of only a limited number of specific compounds (4-hydroxyphenylethanol, 1,2-benzenediol, 2-octenoic acid), strongly suggesting that the intimate association between coal particles and fungal mycelia results in rapid and near-quantitative transfer of coal depolymerisation products into the cell.

Carbon dioxide from coal combustion: Variation with rank of US coal

USGS Publications Warehouse

Quick, J.C.; Glick, D.C.

2000-01-01

Carbon dioxide from combustion of US coal systematically varies with ASTM rank indices, allowing the amount of CO2 produced per net unit of energy to be predicted for individual coals. No single predictive equation is applicable to all coals. Accordingly, we provide one equation for coals above high volatile bituminous rank and another for lower rank coals. When applied to public data for commercial coals from western US mines these equations show a 15% variation of kg CO2 (net GJ)-1. This range of variation suggests reduction of US CO2 emissions is possible by prudent selection of coal for combustion. Maceral and mineral content are shown to slightly affect CO2 emissions from US coal. We also suggest that CO2 emissions increased between 6 and 8% in instances where Midwestern US power plants stopped burning local, high-sulfur bituminous coal and started burning low-sulfur, subbituminous C rank coal from the western US.

30 CFR 870.20 - How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

.../code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html. (a)(1) Calculate the excess moisture percentage using... coals. 870.20 Section 870.20 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.20 How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals. Here are the...

30 CFR 870.20 - How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

.../code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html. (a)(1) Calculate the excess moisture percentage using... coals. 870.20 Section 870.20 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.20 How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals. Here are the...

30 CFR 870.20 - How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

.../code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html. (a)(1) Calculate the excess moisture percentage using... coals. 870.20 Section 870.20 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.20 How to calculate excess moisture in LOW-rank coals. Here are the...

Effect of Water Invasion on Outburst Predictive Index of Low Rank Coals in Dalong Mine

PubMed Central

Jiang, Jingyu; Cheng, Yuanping; Mou, Junhui; Jin, Kan; Cui, Jie

2015-01-01

To improve the coal permeability and outburst prevention, coal seam water injection and a series of outburst prevention measures were tested in outburst coal mines. These methods have become important technologies used for coal and gas outburst prevention and control by increasing the external moisture of coal or decreasing the stress of coal seam and changing the coal pore structure and gas desorption speed. In addition, techniques have had a significant impact on the gas extraction and outburst prevention indicators of coal seams. Globally, low rank coals reservoirs account for nearly half of hidden coal reserves and the most obvious feature of low rank coal is the high natural moisture content. Moisture will restrain the gas desorption and will affect the gas extraction and accuracy of the outburst prediction of coals. To study the influence of injected water on methane desorption dynamic characteristics and the outburst predictive index of coal, coal samples were collected from the Dalong Mine. The methane adsorption/desorption test was conducted on coal samples under conditions of different injected water contents. Selective analysis assessed the variations of the gas desorption quantities and the outburst prediction index (coal cutting desorption index). Adsorption tests indicated that the Langmuir volume of the Dalong coal sample is ~40.26 m3/t, indicating a strong gas adsorption ability. With the increase of injected water content, the gas desorption amount of the coal samples decreased under the same pressure and temperature. Higher moisture content lowered the accumulation desorption quantity after 120 minutes. The gas desorption volumes and moisture content conformed to a logarithmic relationship. After moisture correction, we obtained the long-flame coal outburst prediction (cutting desorption) index critical value. This value can provide a theoretical basis for outburst prediction and prevention of low rank coal mines and similar occurrence conditions

The solubilization of low-ranked coals by microorganisms

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Strandberg, G.W.

1987-07-09

Late in 1984, our Laboratory was funded by the Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center, US Department of Energy, to investigate the potential utility of microorganisms for the solubilization of low-ranked coals. Our approach has been multifacited, including studies of the types of microorganisms involved, appropriate conditions for their growth and coal-solubilization, the suceptibility of different coals to microbial action, the chemical and physical nature of the product, and potential bioprocess designs. A substantial number of fungal species have been shown to be able to solubilize coal. Cohen and Gabrielle reported that two lignin-degrading fungi, Polyporous (Trametes) versicolor and Poria monticola couldmore » solubilize lignite. Ward has isolated several diverse fungi from nature which are capable of degrading different lignites, and our Laboratory has isolated three coal-solubilizing fungi which were found growing on a sample of Texas lignite. The organisms we studied are shown in Table 1. The perceived significance of lignin degradation led us to examine two lignin-degrading strains of the genus Streptomyces. As discussed later, these bacteria were capable of solubilizing coal; but, in the case of at least one, the mechanism was non-enzymatic. The coal-solubilizing ability of other strains of Streptomyces was recently reported. Fakoussa and Trueper found evidence that a strain of Pseudomonas was capble of solubizing coal. It would thus appear that a diverse array of microorganisms possess the ability to solubilize coal. 16 refs.« less

Relationship between Particle Size Distribution of Low-Rank Pulverized Coal and Power Plant Performance

DOE PAGES

Ganguli, Rajive; Bandopadhyay, Sukumar

2012-01-01

Tmore » he impact of particle size distribution (PSD) of pulverized, low rank high volatile content Alaska coal on combustion related power plant performance was studied in a series of field scale tests. Performance was gauged through efficiency (ratio of megawatt generated to energy consumed as coal), emissions (SO 2 , NO x , CO), and carbon content of ash (fly ash and bottom ash). he study revealed that the tested coal could be burned at a grind as coarse as 50% passing 76 microns, with no deleterious impact on power generation and emissions. he PSD’s tested in this study were in the range of 41 to 81 percent passing 76 microns. here was negligible correlation between PSD and the followings factors: efficiency, SO 2 , NO x , and CO. Additionally, two tests where stack mercury (Hg) data was collected, did not demonstrate any real difference in Hg emissions with PSD. he results from the field tests positively impacts pulverized coal power plants that burn low rank high volatile content coals (such as Powder River Basin coal). hese plants can potentially reduce in-plant load by grinding the coal less (without impacting plant performance on emissions and efficiency) and thereby, increasing their marketability.« less

Geogenic organic contaminants in the low-rank coal-bearing Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer of East Texas, USA

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chakraborty, Jayeeta; Varonka, Matthew; Orem, William; Finkelman, Robert B.; Manton, William

2017-06-01

The organic composition of groundwater along the Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer in East Texas (USA), sampled from rural wells in May and September 2015, was examined as part of a larger study of the potential health and environmental effects of organic compounds derived from low-rank coals. The quality of water from the low-rank coal-bearing Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer is a potential environmental concern and no detailed studies of the organic compounds in this aquifer have been published. Organic compounds identified in the water samples included: aliphatics and their fatty acid derivatives, phenols, biphenyls, N-, O-, and S-containing heterocyclic compounds, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), aromatic amines, and phthalates. Many of the identified organic compounds (aliphatics, phenols, heterocyclic compounds, PAHs) are geogenic and originated from groundwater leaching of young and unmetamorphosed low-rank coals. Estimated concentrations of individual compounds ranged from about 3.9 to 0.01 μg/L. In many rural areas in East Texas, coal strata provide aquifers for drinking water wells. Organic compounds observed in groundwater are likely to be present in drinking water supplied from wells that penetrate the coal. Some of the organic compounds identified in the water samples are potentially toxic to humans, but at the estimated levels in these samples, the compounds are unlikely to cause acute health problems. The human health effects of low-level chronic exposure to coal-derived organic compounds in drinking water in East Texas are currently unknown, and continuing studies will evaluate possible toxicity.

Advanced Acid Gas Separation Technology for the Utilization of Low Rank Coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kloosterman, Jeff

2012-12-31

Air Products has developed a potentially ground-breaking technology – Sour Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) – to replace the solvent-based acid gas removal (AGR) systems currently employed to separate sulfur containing species, along with CO{sub 2} and other impurities, from gasifier syngas streams. The Sour PSA technology is based on adsorption processes that utilize pressure swing or temperature swing regeneration methods. Sour PSA technology has already been shown with higher rank coals to provide a significant reduction in the cost of CO{sub 2} capture for power generation, which should translate to a reduction in cost of electricity (COE), compared to baselinemore » CO{sub 2} capture plant design. The objective of this project is to test the performance and capability of the adsorbents in handling tar and other impurities using a gaseous mixture generated from the gasification of lower rank, lignite coal. The results of this testing are used to generate a high-level pilot process design, and to prepare a techno-economic assessment evaluating the applicability of the technology to plants utilizing these coals.« less

Geogenic organic contaminants in the low-rank coal-bearing Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer of East Texas, USA

USGS Publications Warehouse

Chakraborty, Jayeeta; Varonka, Matthew S.; Orem, William H.; Finkelman, Robert B.; Manton, William

2017-01-01

The organic composition of groundwater along the Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer in East Texas (USA), sampled from rural wells in May and September 2015, was examined as part of a larger study of the potential health and environmental effects of organic compounds derived from low-rank coals. The quality of water from the low-rank coal-bearing Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer is a potential environmental concern and no detailed studies of the organic compounds in this aquifer have been published. Organic compounds identified in the water samples included: aliphatics and their fatty acid derivatives, phenols, biphenyls, N-, O-, and S-containing heterocyclic compounds, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), aromatic amines, and phthalates. Many of the identified organic compounds (aliphatics, phenols, heterocyclic compounds, PAHs) are geogenic and originated from groundwater leaching of young and unmetamorphosed low-rank coals. Estimated concentrations of individual compounds ranged from about 3.9 to 0.01 μg/L. In many rural areas in East Texas, coal strata provide aquifers for drinking water wells. Organic compounds observed in groundwater are likely to be present in drinking water supplied from wells that penetrate the coal. Some of the organic compounds identified in the water samples are potentially toxic to humans, but at the estimated levels in these samples, the compounds are unlikely to cause acute health problems. The human health effects of low-level chronic exposure to coal-derived organic compounds in drinking water in East Texas are currently unknown, and continuing studies will evaluate possible toxicity.

Abundances of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in 14 chinese and american coals and their relation to coal rank and weathering

USGS Publications Warehouse

Wang, R.; Liu, Gaisheng; Zhang, Jiahua; Chou, C.-L.; Liu, J.

2010-01-01

The abundances of 16 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) on the priority list of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) have been determined in 14 Chinese and American coals. The ranks of the samples range from lignite, bituminous coal, anthracite, to natural coke. Soxhlet extraction was conducted on each coal for 48 h. The extract was analyzed on a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC-MS). The results show that the total PAH content ranged from 0.31 to 57.6 ??g/g of coal (on a dry basis). It varied with coal rank and is highest in the maturity range of bituminous coal rank. High-molecular-weight (HMW) PAHs are predominant in low-rank coals, but low-molecular-weight (LMW) PAHs are predominant in high-rank coals. The low-sulfur coals have a higher PAH content than high-sulfur coals. It may be explained by an increasing connection between disulfide bonds and PAHs in high-sulfur coal. In addition, it leads us to conclude that the PAH content of coals may be related to the depositional environment. ?? 2010 American Chemical Society.

Method for solubilization of low-rank coal using low molecular weight cell-free filtrates derived from cultures of Coriolus versicolor

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Stewart, D.L.; Fredrickson, J.K.; Campbell, J.A.

1992-01-28

This patent describes a method for isolating an extracellular product derived from a broth of Coriolus versicolor. It comprises separating the cells from a broth of C. versicolor to obtain a cell-free filtrate; separating from the cell-free filtrate a fraction containing molecules of molecular weight in the range of about 500 to 1000 daltons. This patent also describes a method for degrading low-rank coal to a water-soluble material. It comprises contacting the low-rank coal with a cell-free fraction from the broth of Coriolus versicolor containing molecules in the molecular weight range of about 500 to 1000 daltons.

The treatment of some low-rank coals with carbon dioxide water: Effects on slurry-relevant properties: Final report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Slegeir, W.; Sanchez, J.; Coughlan, R.

1986-09-01

This project is concerned with the results of employing CO/sub 2//H/sub 2/O treatments on two low-rank coals. The coals employed in this project were North Dakota lignite from the Indianhead Mine and Utah subbituminous from the Sufco mine. This project is concerned with changes in slurry-relevant characteristics for these low-rank coals due to such treatments. These characteristics include equilibrium moisture, ash content and composition, grindability and slurry rheology. Batch CO/sub 2//water treatments on North Dakota Indianhead lignite afforded a reduction in coal-bound moisture, affording as much as a 35% decrease in equilibrium moisture content. The resulting treated lignite also provedmore » to be a ''cleaner'' coal, with a 30 to 35% reduction in ash content. For the Utah Sufco coal, no appreciable changes in equilibrium moisture were attained and the ash contents generally only slightly reduced Sufco. However, for the more severe treatment, alkaline and alkaline earth were lowered appreciably, with a commensurate increase in ash fusion temperature. For both coals, some improvements in grindability were realized under the most severe treatment conditions (80/sup 0/C, 1200 psi). The less severe conditions afforded little changes in grindability. Some measurements taken of the rheology of treated -200 mesh Indianhead coal slurries have shown non-Newtonian behavior. These slurries settled rapidly when concentrations greater than 50% were reached, hence viscosity measurements were difficult to obtain. Although the mechanism of CO/sub 2//H/sub 2/O action on coal is not clear, the results of this project are consistent with an ion-exchange process, whereby the basic components are exchanged with the hydronium ion of the CO/sub 2//H/sub 2/O mixture. Such ion exchange may lead to other changes in the coal matrix. 38 refs., 8 figs, 18 tabs.« less

Liquefaction of calcium-containing subbituminous coals and coals of lower rank

DOEpatents

Brunson, Roy J.

1979-01-01

An improved process for the treatment of a calcium-containing subbituminous coal and coals of lower rank to form insoluble, thermally stable calcium salts which remain within the solids portions of the residue on liquefaction of the coal, thereby suppressing the formation of scale, made up largely of calcium carbonate which normally forms within the coal liquefaction reactor (i.e., coal liquefaction zone), e.g., on reactor surfaces, lines, auxiliary equipment and the like. An oxide of sulfur, in liquid phase, is contacted with a coal feed sufficient to impregnate the pores of the coal. The impregnated coal, in particulate form, can thereafter be liquefied in a coal liquefaction reactor (reaction zone) at coal liquefaction conditions without significant formation of scale.

CO2 Adsorption in Low-Rank Coals: Progress Toward Assessing the National Capacity to Store CO2 in the Subsurface

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stanton, R. W.; Burruss, R. C.; Flores, R. M.; Warwick, P. D.

2001-05-01

Subsurface environments for geologic storage of CO2 from combustion of fossil fuel include saline formations, depleted oil and gas reservoirs, and unmineable coalbeds. Of these environments, storage in petroleum reservoirs and coal beds offers a potential economic benefit of enhanced recovery of energy resources. Meaningful assessment of the volume and geographic distribution of storage sites requires quantitative estimates of geologic factors that control storage capacity. The factors that control the storage capacity of unmineable coalbeds are poorly understood. In preparation for a USGS assessment of CO2 storage capacity we have begun new measurements of CO2 and CH4 adsorption isotherms of low-rank coal samples from 4 basins. Initial results for 13 samples of low-rank coal beds from the Powder River Basin (9 subbituminous coals), Greater Green River Basin (1 subbituminous coal), Williston Basin (2 lignites) and the Gulf Coast (1 lignite) indicate that their adsorption capacity is up to 10 times higher than it is for CH4. These values contrast with published measurements of the CO2 adsorption capacity of bituminous coals from the Fruitland Formation, San Juan basin, and Gates Formation, British Columbia, that indicate about twice as much carbon dioxide as methane can be adsorbed on coals. Because CH4 adsorption isotherms are commonly measured on coals, CO2 adsorption capacity can be estimated if thecorrect relationship between the gases is known. However, use a factor to predict CO2 adsorption that is twice that of CH4 adsorption, which is common in the published literature, grossly underestimates the storage capacity of widely distributed, thick low-rank coal beds. Complete petrographic and chemical characterization of these low-rank coal samples is in progress. Significant variations in adsorption measurements among samples are depicted depending on the reporting basis used. Properties were measured on an "as received" (moist) basis but can be converted to a

Adsorption isotherms and kinetics of activated carbons produced from coals of different ranks.

PubMed

Purevsuren, B; Lin, Chin-Jung; Davaajav, Y; Ariunaa, A; Batbileg, S; Avid, B; Jargalmaa, S; Huang, Yu; Liou, Sofia Ya-Hsuan

2015-01-01

Activated carbons (ACs) from six coals, ranging from low-rank lignite brown coal to high-rank stone coal, were utilized as adsorbents to remove basic methylene blue (MB) from an aqueous solution. The surface properties of the obtained ACs were characterized via thermal analysis, N2 isothermal sorption, scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and Boehm titration. As coal rank decreased, an increase in the heterogeneity of the pore structures and abundance of oxygen-containing functional groups increased MB coverage on its surface. The equilibrium data fitted well with the Langmuir model, and adsorption capacity of MB ranged from 51.8 to 344.8 mg g⁻¹. Good correlation coefficients were obtained using the intra-particle diffusion model, indicating that the adsorption of MB onto ACs is diffusion controlled. The values of the effective diffusion coefficient ranged from 0.61 × 10⁻¹⁰ to 7.1 × 10⁻¹⁰ m² s⁻¹, indicating that ACs from lower-rank coals have higher effective diffusivities. Among all the ACs obtained from selected coals, the AC from low-rank lignite brown coal was the most effective in removing MB from an aqueous solution.

Development of reliable predictive heat transfer correlations for low-rank coal-fired fluid bed combustors. Final report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Grewal, N.S.

(1) The proposed correlation of Equation (5) is recommended to predict the maximum value of heat transfer coefficient between a horzontal tube and a gas-solid fluidized bed of small particles under the conditions given. For high temperature applications (T/sub B/ > 600/sup 0/C), the radiative component is important and was estimated following Baskakov et al. (2) The proposed correlation of Equation (8) was found reliable to predict the existing data on the maximum value of heat transfer coefficient between a horizontal tube bundle and a gas-solid fluidized bed of small particles under the conditions given. At high temperatures, the radiativemore » component was estimated from the experimental data of Baskakov et al. (3) The correlation of Equation (8) predicted the GFETC data taken during the combustion of low-rank coal very well, when the contribution due to radiation was estimated following Baskakov et al. (4) The correlations proposed by Grewal and Bansal et al. were found to predict the data taken during low-rank coal combustion within +-25%, when the contribution due to radiation was included and estimated following Baskakov et al. (5) Finally, the correlations for large particles (anti d/sub p/ > 1mm) as proposed by Glicksman and Decker, Catipovic et al., Xavier and Davidson, and Zabrodsky et al. also predicted the data for low-rank coal fluidized bed combustor quite well, when the radiative component was estimated from the data of Baskakov et al. 64 references, 19 figures, 10 tables.« less

Liquefaction/solubilization of low-rank Turkish coals by white-rot fungus (Phanerochaete chrysosporium)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Elbeyli, I.Y.; Palantoken, A.; Piskin, S.

2006-08-15

Microbial coal liquefaction/solubilization of three low-rank Turkish coals (Bursa-Kestelek, Kutahya-Seyitomer and Mugla-Yatagan lignite) was attempted by using a white-rot fungus (Phanerochaete chrysosporium DSM No. 6909); chemical compositions of the products were investigated. The lignite samples were oxidized by nitric acid under moderate conditions and then oxidized samples were placed on the agar medium of Phanerochaete chrysosporium. FTIR spectra of raw lignites, oxidized lignites and liquid products were recorded, and the acetone-soluble fractions of these samples were identified by GC-MS technique. Results show that the fungus affects the nitro and carboxyl/carbonyl groups in oxidized lignite sample, the liquid products obtained bymore » microbial effects are the mixture of water-soluble compounds, and show limited organic solubility.« less

A primer on the occurrence of coalbed methane in low-rank coals, with special reference to its potential occurrence in Pakistan

USGS Publications Warehouse

SanFilipo, John R.

2000-01-01

Introduction: This report compiles and updates a series of correspondence that took place between 1998 and early 2000 among the author and representatives of various consulting groups operating in the coal sector of Pakistan. The purpose of the original correspondence was to introduce basic concepts of coalbed methane (CBM) in low-rank coals to planners and other parties interested in the development of Pakistan's coal, particularly the large deposits of the Thar desert area of Sindh Province that were recently discovered (SanFilipo and Khan, 1994) by the Geological Survey of Pakistan (GSP) and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). The author tested two shallow boreholes in Sindh Province for CBM in 1992, including one in Thar, with very marginal results. Additional targets with better CBM prospects were recommended shortly thereafter (SanFilipo and others, 1994), but these were not followed up during subsequent drilling, nor were any other sites tested. Recent events, notably the rapid pace of CBM development in low-rank coals of the Powder River Basin of the U.S., and a show of CBM in commercial quantities in the Cambay Basin of India - both of which are similar in age and rank to most of Pakistan's coal - have indicated a need for reevaluating the initial CBM investigations made in Pakistan in 1992 and for a reassessment of the CBM prospects for the country at large.

Rank of coal beds of the Narragansett basin, Massachusetts and Rhode Island

USGS Publications Warehouse

Lyons, P.C.; Chase, H.B.

1981-01-01

Coal of the Narragansett basin generally has been considered to be anthracite and/or meta-anthracite. However, no single reliable method has been used to distinguish these two ranks in this basin. Three methods - chemical, X-ray, and petrographic - have been used with some degree of success on coal of the Narragansett basin, but too often the results are in conflict. Chemical methods have been limited by inadequate sampling on a coal-bed-by-coal-bed basis and by a lack of analyses made according to (American Society for Testing and Materials, 1974) standard specifications. In addition, when corrections are made by using the Parr formulas, as required by the ASTM (1974) procedures, the generally high to very high ash content of coal from the Narragansett basin causes the fixed-carbon content to appear higher than it actually is. X-ray methods using the degree of graphitization as a measure of rank are not reliable because some of the graphite is related to shearing and brecciation associated with folding and faulting. Petrographic methods using reflectance on vitrinite give results that are generally consistent with results from chemical determinations. However, it is not clear whether the mean maximum reflectance or mean bireflectance is a better indicator of similar rank of such high-rank coals that have been structurally deformed. Coal from the Cranston Mine, RI, is probably meta-anthracite and coal from the Portsmouth Mine is probably anthracite. These ranks are based on chemical,X-ray, and petrographic data and are supported by associated metamorphic mineral assemblages that indicate that the Cranston Mine is in a higher metamorphic zone than the zone containing the Porthmouth Mine. Interpretation of the rank of Mansfield, MA, coal on the basis of extant chemical data is difficult because it is an impure coal with an ash content of 33 to 50%. Reflectance data indicate that the Mansfield, Foxborough, and Plainville coals in the northern part of the Narragansett

Thermal characteristics and surface morphology of char during co-pyrolysis of low-rank coal blended with microalgal biomass: Effects of Nannochloropsis and Chlorella.

PubMed

Wu, Zhiqiang; Yang, Wangcai; Yang, Bolun

2018-02-01

In this work, the influence of Nannochloropsis and Chlorella on the thermal behavior and surface morphology of char during the co-pyrolysis process were explored. Thermogravimetric and iso-conversional methods were applied to analyzing the pyrolytic and kinetic characteristics for different mass ratios of microalgae and low-rank coal (0, 3:1, 1:1, 1:3 and 1). Fractal theory was used to quantitatively determine the effect of microalgae on the morphological texture of co-pyrolysis char. The result indicated that both the Nannochloropsis and Chlorella promoted the release of volatile from low-rank coal. Different synergistic effects on the thermal parameters and yield of volatile were observed, which could be attributed to the different compositions in the Nannochloropsis and Chlorella and operating condition. The distribution of activation energies shows nonadditive characteristics. Fractal dimensions of the co-pyrolysis char were higher than the individual char, indicating the promotion of disordered degree due to the addition of microalgae. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Liquefaction of calcium-containing subbituminous coals and coals of lower rank

DOEpatents

Gorbaty, Martin L.; Taunton, John W.

1980-01-01

A process for the treatment of a calcium-containing subbituminous coal and coals of lower rank to form insoluble, thermally stable calcium salts which remain within the solids portions of the residue on liquefaction of the coal, thereby suppressing the formation scale, made up largely of calcium carbonate deposits, e.g., vaterite, which normally forms within the coal liquefaction reactor (i.e., coal liquefaction zone), e.g., on reactor surfaces, lines, auxiliary equipment and the like. A solution of a compound or salt characterized by the formula MX, where M is a Group IA metal of the Periodic Table of the Elements, and X is an anion which is capable of forming water-insoluble, thermally stable calcium compounds, is maintained in contact with a particulate coal feed sufficient to impregnate said salt or compound into the pores of the coal. On separation of the impregnated particulate coal from the solution, the coal can be liquefied in a coal liquefaction reactor (reaction zone) at coal liquefaction conditions without significant formation of vaterite or other forms of calcium carbonate on reactor surfaces, auxiliary equipment and the like; and the Group IA metal which remains within the liquefaction bottoms catalyzes the reaction when the liquefaction bottoms are subjected to a gasification reaction.

Process for low mercury coal

DOEpatents

Merriam, Norman W.; Grimes, R. William; Tweed, Robert E.

1995-01-01

A process for producing low mercury coal during precombustion procedures by releasing mercury through discriminating mild heating that minimizes other burdensome constituents. Said mercury is recovered from the overhead gases by selective removal.

Characterizing thermogenic coalbed gas from Polish coals of different ranks by hydrous pyrolysis

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kotarba, M.J.; Lewan, M.D.

2004-01-01

To provide a better characterization of origin and volume of thermogenic gas generation from coals, hydrous pyrolysis experiments were conducted at 360??C for 72 h on Polish coals ranging in rank from lignite (0.3% R r) to semi-anthracite (2.0% Rr). Under these conditions, the lignites attained a medium-volatile bituminous rank (1.5% Rr), high-volatile bituminous coals attained a low-volatile bituminous rank (1.7% Rr), and the semi-anthracite obtained an anthracite rank (4.0% R r). Hydrous pyrolysis of a coal, irrespective of rank, provides a diagnostic ??13C value for its thermogenic hydrocarbon gases. This value can be used quantitatively to interpret mixing of indigenous thermogenic gas with microbial methane or exogenous thermogenic gas from other sources. Thermogenic methane quantities range from 20 dm3/kg of lignite (0.3% Rr) to 0.35 dm3/kg of semi-anthracite (2.0% Rr). At a vitrinite reflectance of 1.7% Rr, approximately 75% of the maximum potential for a coal to generate thermogenic methane has been expended. At a vitrinite reflectance of 1.7% Rr, more than 90% of the maximum potential for a coal to generate CO2 has been expended. Assuming that these quantities of generated CO2 remain associated with a sourcing coal bed as uplift or erosion provide conditions conducive for microbial methanogenesis, the resulting quantities of microbial methane generated by complete CO2 reduction can exceed the quantities of thermogenic methane generated from the same coal bed by a factor of 2-5. ?? 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Process for low mercury coal

DOEpatents

Merriam, N.W.; Grimes, R.W.; Tweed, R.E.

1995-04-04

A process is described for producing low mercury coal during precombustion procedures by releasing mercury through discriminating mild heating that minimizes other burdensome constituents. Said mercury is recovered from the overhead gases by selective removal. 4 figures.

A geochemical investigation into the effect of coal rank on the potential environmental effects of CO2 sequestration in deep coal beds

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolak, Jonathan J.; Burruss, Robert A.

2005-01-01

Coal samples of different rank were extracted in the laboratory with supercritical CO2 to evaluate the potential for mobilizing hydrocarbons during CO2 sequestration or enhanced coal bed methane recovery from deep coal beds. The concentrations of aliphatic hydrocarbons mobilized from the subbituminous C, high-volatile C bituminous, and anthracite coal samples were 41.2, 43.1, and 3.11 ?g g-1 dry coal, respectively. Substantial, but lower, concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were mobilized from these samples: 2.19, 10.1, and 1.44 ?g g-1 dry coal, respectively. The hydrocarbon distributions within the aliphatic and aromatic fractions obtained from each coal sample also varied with coal rank and reflected changes to the coal matrix associated with increasing degree of coalification. Bitumen present within the coal matrix may affect hydrocarbon partitioning between coal and supercritical CO2. The coal samples continued to yield hydrocarbons during consecutive extractions with supercritical CO2. The amount of hydrocarbons mobilized declined with each successive extraction, and the relative proportion of higher molecular weight hydrocarbons increased during successive extractions. These results demonstrate that the potential for mobilizing hydrocarbons from coal beds, and the effect of coal rank on this process, are important to consider when evaluating coal beds for CO2 storage.

Efficient volatile metal removal from low rank coal in gasification, combustion, and processing systems and methods

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bland, Alan E.; Sellakumar, Kumar Muthusami; Newcomer, Jesse D.

Efficient coal pre-processing systems (69) integrated with gasification, oxy-combustion, and power plant systems include a drying chamber (28), a volatile metal removal chamber (30), recirculated gases, including recycled carbon dioxide (21), nitrogen (6), and gaseous exhaust (60) for increasing the efficiencies and lowering emissions in various coal processing systems.

Effects of low-temperature catalytic pretreatments on coal structure and reactivity in liquefaction. Final technical report, Volume 1 - effects of solvents, catalysts and temperature conditions on conversion and structural changes of low-rank coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Huang, Lili; Schobert, Harold H.; Song, Chunshan

1998-01-01

The main objectives of this project were to study the effects of low-temperature pretreatments on coal structure and their impacts on subsequent liquefaction. The effects of pretreatment temperatures, catalyst type, coal rank, and influence of solvent were examined. Specific objectives were to identify the basic changes in coal structure induced by catalytic and thermal pretreatments, and to determine the reactivity of the catalytically and thermally treated coals for liquefaction. In the original project management plan it was indicated that six coals would be used for the study. These were to include two each of bituminous, subbituminous, and lignite rank. Formore » convenience in executing the experimental work, two parallel efforts were conducted. The first involved the two lignites and one subbituminous coal; and the second, the two bituminous coals and the remaining subbituminous coal. This Volume presents the results of the first portion of the work, studies on two lignites and one subbituminous coal. The remaining work accomplished under this project will be described and discussed in Volume 2 of this report. The objective of this portion of the project was to determine and compare the effects of solvents, catalysts and reaction conditions on coal liquefaction. Specifically, the improvements of reaction conversion, product distribution, as well as the structural changes in the coals and coal-derived products were examined. This study targeted at promoting hydrogenation of the coal-derived radicals, generated during thermal cleavage of chemical bonds, by using a good hydrogen donor-solvent and an effective catalyst. Attempts were also made in efforts to match the formation and hydrogenation of the free radicals and thus to prevent retrogressive reaction.« less

Did the Middlesboro, Kentucky, bolide impact event influence coal rank?

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hower, J.C.; Greb, S.F.; Kuehn, K.W.; Eble, C.F.

2009-01-01

The Middlesboro Basin, southeastern Kentucky, occurs on the Cumberland Overthrust Sheet and includes a ca. 5.5-km diameter impact structure. The Lower and Middle Pennsylvanian coal-bearing strata are faulted, with some evidence for shock metamorphism. The event post-dated the latest-Pennsylvanian-early-Permian thrusting and was likely prior to late-Mesozoic entrenchment of drainages. The impact of a 0.5-km meteor traveling at ca. 60,000??km/h would release about 1??EJ, the approximate equivalent of the instantaneous combustion of 30??Mt of coal. The coal rank, while increased slightly above the regional level, still is within the upper portion of the high volatile A bituminous rank range. This helps to constrain the depth of burial at the time of the impact. The coal would have had to have been at a depth of a few kilometers to have avoided a more substantial rank increase. In addition, it is possible that some of the coal rank increase might be attributable to movements along the cross-cutting Rocky Face fault, unrelated to the impact. ?? 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Research on Improving Low Rank Coal Caking Ability by Moderate Hydrogenation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Peng

2017-12-01

The hydrogenation test of low metamorphic coal was carried out by using a continuous hydrogen reactor at the temperature of (350-400)°C and the initial hydrogen pressure of 3 ~ 6Mpa. The purpose of the experiment was to increase the caking property, and the heating time was controlled from 30 to 50min. The test results show that the mild hydrogenation test, no adhesion of low metamorphic coal can be transformed into a product having adhesion, oxygen elements in coal have good removal, the calorific value of the product has been improved significantly and coal particles during pyrolysis, swelling, catalyst, hydrogenation, structural changes and the combined effects of particles a new component formed between financial and is a major cause of coal caking enhancement and lithofacies change, coal blending test showed that the product can be used effectively in the coking industry.

Chemicals from low temperature liquid-phase cracking of coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sato, Y.; Kodera, Y.; Kamo, T.

1999-07-01

Mild gasification and low temperature pyrolysis are considered to be the most promising process for high-moisture subbituminous and lignite coal to produce upgraded solid fuel with high heating value and low sulfur, and to produce a useful liquid product. However effective technology to prevent spontaneous combustion of solid product and to utilize oxygen-rich liquid product has not yet been reported to enhance commercial feasibility of these process. In this study, liquid-phase cracking of low rank coal at 350--450 C under 2 MPa of initial nitrogen atmosphere has been studied to produce upgraded coal and value added liquid product. Liquid-phase crackingmore » of Wyoming subbituminous Buckskin coal using iron oxide catalyst in the presence of t-decalin at 440C gave 10 wt% of liquid product, 12 wt% of gases and 74 wt% of upgraded coal with small amount of water. Gaseous product consisted of mainly carbon dioxide (62wt%) and methane. Therefore, cracking of carboxylic function took place effectively in these conditions. Liquid product contains BTX, phenols and alkylphenols. Concentrated chemicals of BTX, phenol and cresols from the liquid products by hydrocracking and hydrotreating will be discussed.« less

30 CFR 870.19 - How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... coals. 870.19 Section 870.19 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.19 How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals. Here are the requirements for calculating the excess moisture in high-rank coals for a calendar quarter. ASTM standards...

30 CFR 870.19 - How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... coals. 870.19 Section 870.19 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.19 How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals. Here are the requirements for calculating the excess moisture in high-rank coals for a calendar quarter. ASTM standards...

Acoustic emission and sorptive deformation induced in coals of various rank by the sorption-desorption of gas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Majewska, Zofia; Ziętek, Jerzy

2007-09-01

Simultaneous measurements of acoustic emission (AE) and expansion/contraction of coal samples subjected to gas sorption-desorption processes were conducted on high-and medium-rank coal. The aim of this study was to examine the influence of the coal rank and type of sorbate on measured AE and strain characteristics. The experimental equipment employed in this study consisted of a pressure vessel and associated pressurisation and monitoring units. The arrangement of pressure-vacuum valves permitted the coal sample to be pressurised and depressurised. Carbon-dioxide and methane were used as sorbats. Acoustic emission and strains were recorded continuously for a period of 50 hours during sorption and for at least 12 hours during the desorption process. Tests were conducted on cylindrical coal samples at 298 K. The experimental data were presented as plots of AE basic parameters versus time and in strain diagrams. These studies lead to the following conclusions: 1. There are significant differences in AE and strain characteristics for the two systems (coal-CO2 and coal-CH4); 2. There is a direct influence of rank and type of coal on its behaviour during the sorption-desorption of gas. An attempt has been made to interpret the results obtained on the grounds of the copolymer model of coal structure. More research is needed into this topic in order to get a quantitative description of the observed facts.

Impacts of Natural Surfactant Soybean Phospholipid on Wettability of High-rank Coal Reservoir

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lyu, S.; Xiao, Y.; Yuan, M.; Wang, S.

2017-12-01

It is significant to change the surface wettability of coal rock with the surfactant in coal mining and coalbed methane exploitation. Soybean phospholipid (SP) is a kind of natural zwitterionic surfactant which is non-toxic and degradable. In order to study the effects of soybean phospholipid on wettability of high-rank coal in Qinshui Basin, some experiments including surface tension test, contact angle measurement on the coal surface, coal fines imbibition, observation of dispersion effect and gas permeability test were carried out, and water locking mechanism of fracturing fluid in micro fractures of coal reservoir was analyzed. The results show that the surface of high-rank coal was negatively charged in solution and of weak hydrophilicity. The soybean phospholipid with the mass fraction of 0.1% reduced the surface tension of water by 69%, and increased the wettability of coal. Meanwhile, the soybean phospholipid helped coal fines to disperse by observation of the filter cake with the scanning electron microscope. The rising rate of soybean phospholipid solution in the pipe filled with coal fines was lower than that of anionic and cationic surfactant, higher than that of clean water and non-ionic surfactant. Composite surfactant made up of soybean phospholipid and OP-10 at the ratio of 1:3 having a low surface tension and large contact angle, reduced the capillary force effectively, which could be conducive to discharge of fracturing fluid from coal reservoir micro fracture and improve the migration channels of gas. Therefore it has a broad application prospect.

Case studies on direct liquefaction of low rank Wyoming coal

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Adler, P.; Kramer, S.J.; Poddar, S.K.

Previous Studies have developed process designs, costs, and economics for the direct liquefaction of Illinois No. 6 and Wyoming Black Thunder coals at mine-mouth plants. This investigation concerns two case studies related to the liquefaction of Wyoming Black Thunder coal. The first study showed that reducing the coal liquefaction reactor design pressure from 3300 to 1000 psig could reduce the crude oil equivalent price by 2.1 $/bbl provided equivalent performing catalysts can be developed. The second one showed that incentives may exist for locating a facility that liquifies Wyoming coal on the Gulf Coast because of lower construction costs andmore » higher labor productivity. These incentives are dependent upon the relative values of the cost of shipping the coal to the Gulf Coast and the increased product revenues that may be obtained by distributing the liquid products among several nearby refineries.« less

Advanced coal conversion process demonstration. Technical progress report for the period July 1, 1995--September 30, 1995

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

NONE

1997-05-01

This report describes the technical progress made on the Advanced Coal Conversion Process (ACCP) Demonstration Project from July 1, 1995 through September 30, 1995. The ACCP Demonstration Project is a US Department of Energy (DOE) Clean Coal Technology Project. This project demonstrates an advanced, thermal, coal upgrading process, coupled with physical cleaning techniques, that is designed to upgrade high-moisture, low-rank coals to a high-quality, low-sulfur fuel, registered as the SynCoal process. The coal is processed through three stages (two heating stages followed by an inert cooling stage) of vibrating fluidized bed reactors that remove chemically bound water, carboxyl groups, andmore » volatile sulfur compounds. After thermal upgrading, the cola is put through a deep-bed stratifier cleaning process to separate the pyrite-rich ash from the coal.« less

Scoping Studies to Evaluate the Benefits of an Advanced Dry Feed System on the Use of Low-Rank Coal

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rader, Jeff; Aguilar, Kelly; Aldred, Derek

2012-11-30

This report describes the development of the design of an advanced dry feed system that was carried out under Task 4.0 of Cooperative Agreement DE-FE0007902 with the US DOE, “Scoping Studies to Evaluate the Benefits of an Advanced Dry Feed System on the use of Low- Rank Coal.” The resulting design will be used for the advanced technology IGCC case with 90% carbon capture for sequestration to be developed under Task 5.0 of the same agreement. The scope of work covered coal preparation and feeding up through the gasifier injector. Subcomponents have been broken down into feed preparation (including grindingmore » and drying), low pressure conveyance, pressurization, high pressure conveyance, and injection. Pressurization of the coal feed is done using Posimetric1 Feeders sized for the application. In addition, a secondary feed system is described for preparing and feeding slag additive and recycle fines to the gasifier injector. This report includes information on the basis for the design, requirements for down selection of the key technologies used, the down selection methodology and the final, down selected design for the Posimetric Feed System, or PFS.« less

Chemical and toxicological evaluation of underground coal gasification (UCG) effluents. The coal rank effect.

PubMed

Kapusta, Krzysztof; Stańczyk, Krzysztof

2015-02-01

The effect of coal rank on the composition and toxicity of water effluents resulting from two underground coal gasification experiments with distinct coal samples (lignite and hard coal) was investigated. A broad range of organic and inorganic parameters was determined in the sampled condensates. The physicochemical tests were supplemented by toxicity bioassays based on the luminescent bacteria Vibrio fischeri as the test organism. The principal component analysis and Pearson correlation analysis were adopted to assist in the interpretation of the raw experimental data, and the multiple regression statistical method was subsequently employed to enable predictions of the toxicity based on the values of the selected parameters. Significant differences in the qualitative and quantitative description of the contamination profiles were identified for both types of coal under study. Independent of the coal rank, the most characteristic organic components of the studied condensates were phenols, naphthalene and benzene. In the inorganic array, ammonia, sulphates and selected heavy metals and metalloids were identified as the dominant constituents. Except for benzene with its alkyl homologues (BTEX), selected polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), zinc and selenium, the values of the remaining parameters were considerably greater for the hard coal condensates. The studies revealed that all of the tested UCG condensates were extremely toxic to V. fischeri; however, the average toxicity level for the hard coal condensates was approximately 56% higher than that obtained for the lignite. The statistical analysis provided results supporting that the toxicity of the condensates was most positively correlated with the concentrations of free ammonia, phenols and certain heavy metals. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Coal Rank and Stratigraphy of Pennsylvanian Coal and Coaly Shale Samples, Young County, North-Central Texas

USGS Publications Warehouse

Guevara, Edgar H.; Breton, Caroline; Hackley, Paul C.

2007-01-01

Vitrinite reflectance measurements were made to determine the rank of selected subsurface coal and coaly shale samples from Young County, north-central Texas, for the National Coal Resources Database System State Cooperative Program conducted by the Bureau of Economic Geology at The University of Texas at Austin. This research is the continuation of a pilot study that began in adjacent Archer County, and forms part of a larger investigation of the coalbed methane resource potential of Pennsylvanian coals in north-central Texas. A total of 57 samples of coal and coaly shale fragments were hand-picked from drill cuttings from depths of about 2,000 ft in five wells, and Ro determinations were made on an initial 10-sample subset. Electric-log correlation of the sampled wells indicates that the collected samples represent coal and coaly shale layers in the Strawn (Pennsylvanian), Canyon (Pennsylvanian), and Cisco (Pennsylvanian-Permian) Groups. Coal rank in the initial sample subset ranges from lignite (Ro=0.39), in a sample from the Cisco Group at a depth of 310 to 320 ft, to high volatile bituminous A coal (Ro=0.91) in a sample from the lower part of the Canyon Group at a depth of 2,030 to 2,040 ft.

Characteristics of fundamental combustion and NOx emission using various rank coals.

PubMed

Kim, Sung Su; Kang, Youn Suk; Lee, Hyun Dong; Kim, Jae-Kwan; Hong, Sung Chang

2011-03-01

Eight types of coals of different rank were selected and their fundamental combustion characteristics were examined along with the conversion of volatile nitrogen (N) to nitrogen oxides (NOx)/fuel N to NOx. The activation energy, onset temperature, and burnout temperature were obtained from the differential thermogravimetry curve and Arrhenius plot, which were derived through thermo-gravimetric analysis. In addition, to derive the combustion of volatile N to NOx/fuel N to NOx, the coal sample, which was pretreated at various temperatures, was burned, and the results were compared with previously derived fundamental combustion characteristics. The authors' experimental results confirmed that coal rank was highly correlated with the combustion of volatile N to NOx/fuel N to NOx.

The petrology of some Indians coals

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Daulay, Bukin; Cook, Alan C.

Samples from coal seams from all of the major Indonesian coalfields, were examined using reflected white light and reflected flourescence mode microscopy techniques. The coals are rich in vitrinite and have variable, commonly high, contents of liptinite. Inertinite is rare to sparse, with the exception of a few (typically Neogene) coals. Overall, no major differences in coal type exist bewteen Paleogene and Neogene coals. Most of the coals are low in rank ( vitrinite reflectanceoverlineRvmax, 0.30% to 0.57% ). The Neogene coals are typically much lower in rank than the Paleogene coals, and this tendency is most clearly seen within the Kalimantan occurences ( PaleogeneoverlineRvmax 0.53% to 0.67%; Neogene 0.30% to 0.57% ). In Sumatera at Bukit Asam, contact alteration from intrusions causes a marked rise in overlineRv max from the range 0.30% to 0.53% overlineRv max to semi-anthracite (2.6%). Near the intrusions, very high lateral and vertical rank gradients are present. At Ombilin in central west Sumatera, regional rank is relatively high ( overlineRvmax 0.55% to 0.77% ), and similar effects from contact alteration ( overlineRvmax up to 4.6% ) can again be detected. The coals are suitable for power generation. Grindability characteristics should be generally favourable, but the rank of the coals is typically sufficiently low for spontaneous combusion to be a significant problem. The rank of the coals is generally too low for use as a single component charge in conventional coke ovens. Significant reverses exist of coals that could be added as a minor component to imported strongly coals to decrease the foreign exchange cost of coke. The rank and type indicate that yield characteristics should be good for most liquefaction and gasification processes. The coals, and to a lesser extent associated dispersed organic matter, form important source rocks for some of the major natural oil accumulations in Indonesians sedimentary basins.

Diagenetic trends of a tertiary low-rank coal series

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boudou, Jean-Paul; Durand, Bernard; Oudin, Jean-Louis

1984-10-01

The Mahakam delta (Kalimantan, Indonesia) coals represent all the evolution stages between freshly-deposited plant/peat material, lignites and bituminous coals. The geochemical techniques used to study this coal series included elemental analysis, extraction of humic compounds, infrared spectroscopy and 13C nuclear magnetic resonance of the total coal. The main mechanisms of early maturation in this series are loss of oxygenated compounds, aromatisation and condensation of the organic matter. These changes, which have already been suggested for other coal series and partially reported for sedimentary organic matter, were confirmed and described in more detail for the Mahakam coal series.

Investigation of pyrolysis kinetics of humic acids from low rank Anatolian coal by thermal analysis

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Tonbul, Y.; Erdogan, S.

2007-07-01

Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) of humic acid samples from low rank Anatolian (east of Turkey, Bingol) coal were investigated under atmospheric pressure. The samples were subjected for the decomposition of organic matter ambient to 800{sup o} C at four different heating rates (5, 10, 15, and 20 degrees C min{sup -1}). The humic acid samples were started at decomposition between 170 - 206{sup o}C and amount of residues varied 55-60% according to heating rate. Each of samples showed a single step mass loss. TG/DTG data of samples were analyzed to determine activation energy values by Coats and Redfern method and Arrheniusmore » method. Activation energy values are similar obtained from Coats and Redfern method and Arrhenius method and varied from 25 to 29 kJ mol{sup -1}.« less

Beyond Low Rank + Sparse: Multi-scale Low Rank Matrix Decomposition

PubMed Central

Ong, Frank; Lustig, Michael

2016-01-01

We present a natural generalization of the recent low rank + sparse matrix decomposition and consider the decomposition of matrices into components of multiple scales. Such decomposition is well motivated in practice as data matrices often exhibit local correlations in multiple scales. Concretely, we propose a multi-scale low rank modeling that represents a data matrix as a sum of block-wise low rank matrices with increasing scales of block sizes. We then consider the inverse problem of decomposing the data matrix into its multi-scale low rank components and approach the problem via a convex formulation. Theoretically, we show that under various incoherence conditions, the convex program recovers the multi-scale low rank components either exactly or approximately. Practically, we provide guidance on selecting the regularization parameters and incorporate cycle spinning to reduce blocking artifacts. Experimentally, we show that the multi-scale low rank decomposition provides a more intuitive decomposition than conventional low rank methods and demonstrate its effectiveness in four applications, including illumination normalization for face images, motion separation for surveillance videos, multi-scale modeling of the dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging and collaborative filtering exploiting age information. PMID:28450978

Mercury capture by selected Bulgarian fly ashes: Influence of coal rank and fly ash carbon pore structure on capture efficiency

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kostova, I.J.; Hower, J.C.; Mastalerz, Maria; Vassilev, S.V.

2011-01-01

Mercury capture by fly ash C was investigated at five lignite- and subbituminous-coal-burning Bulgarian power plants (Republika, Bobov Dol, Maritza East 2, Maritza East 3, and Sliven). Although the C content of the ashes is low, never exceeding 1.6%, the Hg capture on a unit C basis demonstrates that the low-rank-coal-derived fly ash carbons are more efficient in capturing Hg than fly ash carbons from bituminous-fired power plants. While some low-C and low-Hg fly ashes do not reveal any trends of Hg versus C, the 2nd and, in particular, the 3rd electrostatic precipitator (ESP) rows at the Republika power plant do have sufficient fly ash C range and experience flue gas sufficiently cool to capture measurable amounts of Hg. The Republika 3rd ESP row exhibits an increase in Hg with increasing C, as observed in other power plants, for example, in Kentucky power plants burning Appalachian-sourced bituminous coals. Mercury/C decreases with an increase in fly ash C, suggesting that some of the C is isolated from the flue gas stream and does not contribute to Hg capture. Mercury capture increases with an increase in Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area and micropore surface area. The differences in Hg capture between the Bulgarian plants burning low-rank coal and high volatile bituminous-fed Kentucky power plants suggests that the variations in C forms resulting from the combustion of the different ranks also influence the efficiency of Hg capture. ?? 2010 Elsevier Ltd.

Microbial solubilization of coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Campbell, J.A.; Fredrickson, J.K.; Stewart, D.L.

1988-11-01

Microbial solubilization of coal may serve as a first step in a process to convert low-rank coals or coal-derived products to other fuels or products. For solubilization of coal to be an economically viable technology, a mechanistic understanding of the process is essential. Leonardite, a highly oxidized, low-rank coal, has been solubilized by the intact microorganism, cell-free filtrate, and cell-free enzyme of /ital Coriolus versicolor/. A spectrophotometric conversion assay was developed to quantify the amount of biosolubilized coal. In addition, a bituminous coal, Illinois No. 6, was solubilized by a species of /ital Penicillium/, but only after the coal hadmore » been preoxidized in air. Model compounds containing coal-related functionalities have been incubated with the leonardite-degrading fungus, its cell-free filtrate, and purified enzyme. The amount of degradation was determined by gas chromatography and the degradation products were identified by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. We have also separated the cell-free filtrate of /ital C. versicolor/ into a <10,000 MW and >10,000 MW fraction by ultrafiltration techniques. Most of the coal biosolubilization activity is contained in the <10,000 MW fraction while the model compound degradation occurs in the >10,000 MW fraction. The >10,000 MW fraction appears to contain an enzyme with laccase-like activity. 10 refs., 8 figs., 5 tabs.« less

Heat transfer to horizontal tubes in a pilot-scale fluidized-bed combustor burning low-rank coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Grewal, N.S.; Goblirsch, G.

Experimental data are obtained for the heat transfer coefficient between immersed horizontal tube bundles and an atmospheric-fluidized-bed combustor burning low-rank coals. Silica sand and limestone are used as bed material. The tests are conducted, with and without limestone addition and ash recycle, at average bed temperatures ranging from 1047 to 1125 K, superficial fluidizing velocity of 1.66 to 2.04 m/s, and excess air levels of 15 to 40 percent. The experimental data are examined in the light of the existing correlations for the heat transfer coefficient. The predicted values of heat transfer coefficient from the correlations proposed by Grewal andmore » Bansal et al. are found to be within + or - 25 percent of the experimental values of heat transfer coefficient, when the contribution due to radiation is also included.« less

30 CFR 870.19 - How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

...-6030, or go to: http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html... coals. 870.19 Section 870.19 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.19 How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals. Here are the...

30 CFR 870.19 - How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

...-6030, or go to: http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html... coals. 870.19 Section 870.19 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.19 How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals. Here are the...

30 CFR 870.19 - How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

...-6030, or go to: http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/code_of_federal_regulations/ibr_locations.html... coals. 870.19 Section 870.19 Mineral Resources OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING RECLAMATION AND ENFORCEMENT... COAL PRODUCTION REPORTING § 870.19 How to calculate excess moisture in HIGH-rank coals. Here are the...

Continuous process for conversion of coal

DOEpatents

Knudson, Curtis L.; Willson, Warrack G.; Baker, Gene G.; Sondreal, Everett A.; Farnum, Sylvia A.

1982-01-01

An improved process for converting coal to liquid and gaseous products wherein the liquid products predominate and wherein reactor, tubing, and valve plugging due to carbonate salt formation is reduced by reacting crushed low-rank coal containing about 12 to 30% by weight of water in a solvent at a temperature in the range of about 455.degree. to 500.degree. C., under about 2000 to 5000 psi pressure of a H.sub.2 /CO mixture for a liquid residence time of about 20 to 60 minutes. The solvent is a fraction of liquid product defined on a weight basis as being made up of about 55% of which distills at less than 250.degree. C./lmm, about 20% of which is soluble in THF, and about 25% of which is carbon polymer and indigenous inorganic matter. The solvent is further defined as containing at least about 5 weight % of partially hydrogenated aromatics and/or fully hydrogenated aromatics and little or no alkylated aromatics or higher alkanes.

Combustion and gasification characteristics of chars from four commercially significant coals of different rank. Final report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nsakala, N.Y.; Patel, R.L.; Lao, T.C.

1982-09-01

The combustion and gasification kinetics of four size graded coal chars were investigated experimentally in Combustion Engineering's Drop Tube Furnace System (DTFS). The chars were prepared in the DTFS from commercially significant coals representing a wide range of rank; these included a Pittsburgh No. 8 Seam hvAb coal, an Illinois No. 6 Seam hvCb coal, a Wyoming Sub C, and a Texas Lignite A. Additionally, a number of standard ASTM and special bench scale tests were performed on the coals and chars to characterize their physicochemical properties. Results showed that the lower rank coal chars were more reactive than themore » higher rank coal chars and that combustion reactions of chars were much faster than the corresponding gasification reactions. Fuel properties, temperature, and reactant gas partial pressure had a significant influence on both combustion and gasification, and particle size had a mild but discernible influence on gasification. Fuel reactivities were closely related to pore structure. Computer simulation of the combustion and gasification performances of the subject samples in the DTFS supported the experimental findings.« less

Low-Cost Aqueous Coal Desulfurization

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kalvinskas, J. J.; Vasilakos, N.; Corcoran, W. H.; Grohmann, K.; Rohatgi, N. K.

1982-01-01

Water-based process for desulfurizing coal not only eliminates need for costly organic solvent but removes sulfur more effectively than an earlier solvent-based process. New process could provide low-cost commercial method for converting high-sulfur coal into environmentally acceptable fuel.

Environmentally and economically efficient utilization of coal processing waste.

PubMed

Dmitrienko, Margarita A; Strizhak, Pavel A

2017-11-15

High concentrations of hazardous anthropogenic emissions (sulfur, nitrogen and carbon oxides) from solid fuel combustion in coal burning plants cause environmental problems that have been especially pressing over the last 20-30 years. A promising solution to these problems is a switch from conventional pulverized coal combustion to coal-water slurry fuel. In this paper, we pay special attention to the environmental indicators characterizing the combustion of different coal ranks (gas, flame, coking, low-caking, and nonbaking coals) and coal-water slurry fuels based on the coal processing waste - filter cakes. There have been no consistent data so far on the acceptable intervals for the anthropogenic emissions of sulfur (SO x ), nitrogen (NO x ) and carbon (CO, CO 2 ) oxides. Using a specialized combustion chamber and gas analyzing system, we have measured the concentrations of typical coal and filter-cake-based CWS combustion products. We have also calculated the typical combustion heat of the fuels under study and measured the ratio between environmental and energy attributes. The research findings show that the use of filter cakes in the form of CWS is even better than coals in terms of environment and economy. Wide utilization of filter cakes solves many environmental problems: the areas of contaminated sites shrink, anthropogenic emissions decrease, and there is no need to develop new coal mines anymore. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Heat transfer to horizontal tubes in a pilot-scale fluidized-bed combustor burning low-rank coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Grewal, N.S.; Goblirsch, G.

Experimental data are obtained for the heat transfer coefficient between immersed horizontal tube bundles and an atmospheric-fluidized-bed combustor burning low-rank coals. Silica sand (d/sub p/ = 888 to 1484 ..mu..m) and limestone (d/sub p/ = 716 to 1895 ..mu..m) are used as bed material. The tests are conducted, with and without limestone addition and ash recycle, at average bed temperatures ranging from 1047 to 1125/sup 0/K, superficial fluidizing velocity of 1.66 to 2.04 m/s, and excess air levels of 15 to 40 percent. The experimental data are examined in the light of the existing correlations for the heat transfer coefficient.more » The predicted values of heat transfer coefficient from the correlations proposed by Grewal (1981) and Bansal et al. (1980) are found to be within +-25 percent of the experimental values of heat transfer coefficient, when the contribution due to radiation is also included. 5 figures, 5 tables.« less

Liquid CO 2/Coal Slurry for Feeding Low Rank Coal to Gasifiers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Marasigan, Jose; Goldstein, Harvey; Dooher, John

2013-09-30

This study investigates the practicality of using a liquid CO 2/coal slurry preparation and feed system for the E-Gas™ gasifier in an integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) electric power generation plant configuration. Liquid CO 2 has several property differences from water that make it attractive for the coal slurries used in coal gasification-based power plants. First, the viscosity of liquid CO 2 is much lower than water. This means it should take less energy to pump liquid CO 2 through a pipe compared to water. This also means that a higher solids concentration can be fed to the gasifier, whichmore » should decrease the heat requirement needed to vaporize the slurry. Second, the heat of vaporization of liquid CO 2 is about 80% lower than water. This means that less heat from the gasification reactions is needed to vaporize the slurry. This should result in less oxygen needed to achieve a given gasifier temperature. And third, the surface tension of liquid CO 2 is about 2 orders of magnitude lower than water, which should result in finer atomization of the liquid CO 2 slurry, faster reaction times between the oxygen and coal particles, and better carbon conversion at the same gasifier temperature. EPRI and others have recognized the potential that liquid CO 2 has in improving the performance of an IGCC plant and have previously conducted systemslevel analyses to evaluate this concept. These past studies have shown that a significant increase in IGCC performance can be achieved with liquid CO 2 over water with certain gasifiers. Although these previous analyses had produced some positive results, they were still based on various assumptions for liquid CO 2/coal slurry properties.« less

Size segregation of component coals during pulverization of high volatile/low volatile blends

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Davis, A.; Orban, P.C.

1995-12-31

Samples of single high volatile (hvb) and low volatile (lvb) coals and binary blends in proportions ranging from 75%hvb/25%lvb to 25%hvb/75%lvb were pulverized in a Raymond 271 bowl mill and then screened into different size fractions. The ranks of two of the feed coals were sufficiently different that individual particles could be distinguished microscopically. This enabled the proportions of each feed coal in the various blend size fractions to be determined. The difference in rank and therefore grindability of the components (Hardgrove indices of 99 versus 50) was such that significant segregation resulted. For example, the 25%hvb/75%lvb blend, upon grinding,more » produced a +50 mesh (300 {micro}m) fraction with 30% lvb coal, and a {minus}325 mesh (45 {micro}m) fraction with 84% lvb coal. The effect of this segregation according to size was a notable progressive decrease in volatility towards the finer fractions, consistent with an increase in the proportion of lvb particles; differences in volatile matter (d.b.) between coarsest and finest fractions of up to 6.9% were encountered. Although most of the segregation is attributable to rank difference between the component coals, part appears to be due to the lower grindability of liptinite-rich lithotypes in the hvb coal.« less

Low temperature aqueous desulfurization of coal

DOEpatents

Slegeir, W.A.; Healy, F.E.; Sapienza, R.S.

1985-04-18

This invention describes a chemical process for desulfurizing coal, especially adaptable to the treatment of coal-water slurries, at temperatures as low as ambient, comprising treating the coal with aqueous titanous chloride whereby hydrogen sulfide is liberated and the desulfurized coal is separated with the conversion of titanous chloride to titanium oxides.

Low temperature aqueous desulfurization of coal

DOEpatents

Slegeir, William A.; Healy, Francis E.; Sapienza, Richard S.

1985-01-01

This invention describes a chemical process for desulfurizing coal, especially adaptable to the treatment of coal-water slurries, at temperatures as low as ambient, comprising treating the coal with aqueous titanous chloride whereby hydrogen sulfide is liberated and the desulfurized coal is separated with the conversion of titanous chloride to titanium oxides.

Rosebud SynCoal Partnership, SynCoal{reg_sign} demonstration technology update

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sheldon, R.W.

1997-12-31

An Advanced Coal Conversion Process (ACCP) technology being demonstrated in eastern Montana (USA) at the heart of one of the world`s largest coal deposits is providing evidence that the molecular structure of low-rank coals can be altered successfully to produce a unique product for a variety of utility and industrial applications. The product is called SynCoal{reg_sign} and the process has been developed by the Rosebud SynCoal Partnership (RSCP) through the US Department of Energy`s multi-million dollar Clean Coal Technology Program. The ACCP demonstration process uses low-pressure, superheated gases to process coal in vibrating fluidized beds. Two vibratory fluidized processing stagesmore » are used to heat and convert the coal. This is followed by a water spray quench and a vibratory fluidized stage to cool the coal. Pneumatic separators remove the solid impurities from the dried coal. There are three major steps to the SynCoal{reg_sign} process: (1) thermal treatment of the coal in an inert atmosphere, (2) inert gas cooling of the hot coal, and (3) removal of ash minerals. When operated continuously, the demonstration plant produces over 1,000 tons per day (up to 300,000 tons per year) of SynCoal{reg_sign} with a 2% moisture content, approximately 11,800b Btu/lb and less than 1.0 pound of SO{sub 2} per million Btu. This product is obtained from Rosebud Mine sub-bituminous coal which starts with 25% moisture, 8,600 Btu/lb and approximately 1.6 pounds of SO{sub 2} per million Btu.« less

Novel electrochemical process for coal conversion

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Farooque, M.

1989-07-01

The feasibility of two distinctly different routes to coal conversion at low severity conditions was investigated. An electrochemical approach utilizing both the electro-oxidation and electro-reduction routes was employed. The electro-oxidation route consists of an electrochemical reaction involving H{sub 2}O and coal, leading to the breakup of coal molecules. The observed reaction rate has been explained as a combination of the coal and pyrite electro-oxidation currents. Organic sulfur has been identified as the contributing factor for the observation of more than 100% H{sub 2} production current efficiency with several coal samples. Also, an attractive coal pre-treatment process has been identified whichmore » results in production of useful products and simultaneous upgrading of the coal. Electrochemical oxidation of coal with H{sub 2}O leads to the production of hydrogen, CO{sub 2}, simultaneous removal of pyritic sulfur, and significant reduction of ash content. There is also indirect evidence that the organic sulfur may be removed in the process. A preliminary economic evaluation of this process has projected a cost advantage of > $8 per ton of Illinois {number sign}2 coal. A lab-scale cell has been successfully employed in this study for generating process data useful for future design calculations. This study also explored the electro-reduction route of coal conversion and has successfully demonstrated production of liquid products from different coal types at low severity conditions. A variety of aliphatic and aromatic compounds have been identified in the products. Coal type appeared to be the most important parameter affecting the product spectrum. 32 refs., 26 figs., 19 tabs.« less

Coal-bed methane potential in Montana

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Campen, E.

1991-06-01

Montana's coal resources are the second largest of the US, with coal underlying approximately 35% of the state. These resources are estimated at 478 billion tons. Associated coal-bed methane resources are estimated to be 14 tcf. The coals of Montana range from Jurassic to early Tertiary in age and from lignite to low-volatile bituminous in rank. Thickness, rank, maceral composition, and proximate and ultimate analyses all vary vertically and laterally. The state contains eight major coal resource areas. A large percentage of Montana's coal consists of the Paleocene Fort Union lignites of eastern Montana, generally considered of too low amore » rank to contain significant methane resources. Most of the state's other coal deposits are higher in rank and contain many recorded methane shows. During Cretaceous and Tertiary times, regressive-transgressive cycles resulted in numerous coal-bearing sequences. Major marine regressions allowed the formation of large peat swamps followed by transgressions which covered the swamps with impervious marine shales, preventing the already forming methane from escaping. About 75% of Montana's coal is less than 1,000 ft below the ground's surface, making it ideal for methane production. Associated water appears to be fresh, eliminating environmental problems. Pipelines are near to most of the major coal deposits. Exploration for coal-bed methane in Montana is still in its infancy but at this time shows commercial promise.« less

Tar yields from low-temperature carbonization of coal facies from the Powder River Basin, Wyoming, USA

USGS Publications Warehouse

Stanton, Ronald W.; Warwick, Peter D.; Swanson, Sharon M.

2005-01-01

Tar yields from low-temperature carbonization correlate with the amount of crypto-eugelinite in samples selected to represent petrographically distinct coal facies of the Wyodak-Anderson coal zone. Tar yields from Fischer Assay range from <1 to 11 wt.% on a dry basis and correspond (r = 0.72) to crypto-eugelinite contents of the coal that range from 15 to 60 vol.%. Core and highwall samples were obtained from active surface mines in the Gillette field, Powder River Basin, Wyoming. Because the rank of the samples is essentially the same, differences in low-temperature carbonization yields are interpreted from compositional differences, particularly the crypto-eugelinite content. In the Wyodak-Anderson coal zone, crypto-eugelinite probably was derived from degraded humic matter which absorbed decomposition products from algae, fungi, bacteria, and liptinitic plant parts (materials possibly high in hydrogen). Previous modeling of the distribution of crypto-eugelinite in the discontinuous Wyodak-Anderson coal zone indicated that tar yields should be greater from coal composing the upper part and interior areas than from coal composing the lower parts and margins of the individual coal bodies. It is possible that hydrocarbon yields from natural coalification processes would be similar to yields obtained from laboratory pyrolysis. If so, the amount of crypto-eugelinite may also be an important characteristic when evaluating coal as source rock for migrated hydrocarbons.

Liquefaction of black thunder coal with counterflow reactor technology

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Parker, R.J.; Simpson, P.L.

There is currently a resurgence of interest in the use of carbon monoxide and water to promote the solubilization of low rank coals in liquefaction processes. The mechanism for the water shift gas reaction (WGSR) is well documented and proceeds via a formate ion intermediate at temperatures up to about 400{degrees}C. Coal solubilization is enhanced by CO/H{sub 2}O and by the solvent effect of the supercritical water. The WGSR is catalyzed by bases (alkali metal carbonates, hydroxides, acetates, aluminates). Many inorganic salts which promote catalytic hydrogenation are rendered inactive in CO/H{sub 2}O, although there is positive evidence for the benefitmore » of using pyrite for both the WGSR and as a hydrogenation catalyst. The temperatures at which coal solubilization occurs are insufficient to promote extensive cracking or upgrading of the solubilized coal. Therefore, a two step process might achieve these two reactions sequentially. Alberta Research Council (ARC) has developed a two-stage process for the coprocessing of low rank coals and petroleum resids/bitumens. This process was further advanced by utilizing the counterflow reactor (CFR) concept pioneered by Canadian Energy Developments (CED) and ARC. The technology is currently being applied to coal liquefaction. The two-stage process employs CO/H{sub 2}O at relatively mid temperature and pressure to solubilize the coal, followed by a more severe hydrocracking step. This paper describes the results of an autoclave study conducted to support a bench unit program on the direct liquefaction of coals.« less

Pyrolysis g.c.-m.s. of a series of degraded woods and coalified logs that increase in rank from peat to subbituminous coal

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hatcher, P.G.; Lerch, H. E.; Kotra, R.K.; Verheyen, T.V.

1988-01-01

Xylem tissue from degraded wood and coalified logs or stems was examined by pyrolysis g.c.-m.s. to improve understanding of the coalification process. The pyrolysis data, when combined with solid-state 13C n.m.r. data for the same samples, show several stages of evolution during coalification. The first stage, microbial degradation in peat, involves the selective degradation of cellulosic components and preservation of lignin-like components. As coalification increases, the lignin structural units undergo a series of defunctionalization reactions. The first of these involve loss of methoxyl groups, with replacement by phenolic hydroxyls such that catechol-like structures are produced. As the xylem tissue is converted to subbituminous coal, the persistence of phenols and methylated phenols in pyrolysis g.c.-m.s. data of subbituminous coal suggests that the catechol-like structures are being converted to phenol-like structures. The ability to discern detailed changes in the chemical structural composition of a genetically and histologically related series of samples provides an ideal method for developing models of coal structure, especially that of low-rank coal. ?? 1988.

Development of clean coal and clean soil technologies using advanced agglomeration techniques

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ignasiak, B.; Ignasiak, T.; Szymocha, K.

1990-01-01

Three major topics are discussed in this report: (1) Upgrading of Low Rank Coals by the Agflotherm Process. Test data, procedures, equipment, etc., are described for co-upgrading of subbituminous coals and heavy oil; (2) Upgrading of Bituminous Coals by the Agflotherm Process. Experimental procedures and data, bench and pilot scale equipments, etc., for beneficiating bituminous coals are described; (3) Soil Clean-up and Hydrocarbon Waste Treatment Process. Batch and pilot plant tests are described for soil contaminated by tar refuse from manufactured gas plant sites. (VC)

Coal resources, production, and quality in the Eastern kentucky coal field: Perspectives on the future of steam coal production

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hower, J.C.; Hiett, J.K.; Wild, G.D.; Eble, C.F.

1994-01-01

The Eastern Kentucky coal field, along with adjacent portions of Virginia and southern West Virginia, is part of the greatest production concentration of high-heating-value, low-sulfur coal in the United States, accounting for over 27% of the 1993 U.S. production of coal of all ranks. Eastern Kentucky's production is spread among many coal beds but is particularly concentrated in a limited number of highquality coals, notably the Pond Creek coal bed and its correlatives, and the Fire Clay coal bed and its correlatives. Both coals are relatively low ash and low sulfur through the areas of the heaviest concentration of mining activity. We discuss production trends, resources, and the quality of in-place and clean coal for those and other major coals in the region. ?? 1994 Oxford University Press.

Interaction and the structures of coal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Opaprakasit, Pakorn

The origin of a decrease in the amount of soluble material from coal upon a reflux treatment has been investigated in an attempt to obtain insight into the nature of the interaction in the macromolecular network structure of coal. This decrease in the extractable material is a result of an increase in the amount of physical cross-links associated with secondary interactions. The alternate possibility of covalent cross-link formation by ether linkage was found to be unlikely because the coal hydroxyl content remains unchanged upon heat treatment. The functional groups responsible for forming these physical cross-links and their contents vary from coal to coal with coal rank. Carboxylate/cation complexes, similar to those found in ionomers, dominate in low rank coal. In high rank coal, the clusters involving pi-cation interactions were observed. Both mechanisms seem to play a role in mid rank coals. These physical cross-links are responsible for a lowering of the extraction yield of coal, but are disrupted by a treatment with acid solution, resulting in an increase in the extraction yield. As a consequence, the cross-links in coal structure should be classified into two types; a "permanent" covalent cross-link, which break under extreme conditions such as chemical reaction and pyrolysis, and "reversible" cross-links, largely associated with ionomer-like structure and pi-cation interactions. The interaction between a "magic" solvent of N-methylpyrollidone and carbon disulfide (NMP/CS2) and its role in the unusual extractability enhancement of Upper Freeport coal has also been investigated. The results strongly suggest that NMP/CS2 mixed solvents form complexes with cations. These mixed solvents are capable of forming a solid complex with cations from NaOH and some simple salts, such as NaCl and LiCl. Given that Upper Freeport coal contains a large amount of mineral matter, it is not surprising that these types of complexes could be formed in the present of the mixed

Organic matter in a coal ball: Peat or coal?

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hatcher, P.G.; Lyons, P.C.; Thompson, C.L.; Brown, F.W.; Maciel, G.E.

1982-01-01

Chemical analyses of morphologically preserved organic matter in a Carboniferous coal ball reveal that the material is coalified to a rank approximately equal to that of the surrounding coal. Hence, the plant tissues in the coal ball were chemically altered by coalification processes and were not preserved as peat. Copyright ?? 1982 AAAS.

Comprehensive evaluation on low-carbon development of coal enterprise groups.

PubMed

Wang, Bang-Jun; Wu, Yan-Fang; Zhao, Jia-Lu

2017-12-19

Scientifically evaluating the level of low-carbon development in terms of theoretical and practical significance is extremely important to coal enterprise groups for implementing national energy-related systems. This assessment can assist in building institutional mechanisms that are conducive for the economic development of coal business cycle and energy conservation as well as promoting the healthy development of coal enterprises to realize coal scientific development and resource utilization. First, by adopting systematic analysis method, this study builds low-carbon development evaluation index system for coal enterprise groups. Second, to determine the weight serving as guideline and criteria of the index, analytic hierarchy process (AHP) is applied using integrated linear weighted sum method to evaluate the level of low-carbon development of coal enterprise groups. Evaluation is also performed by coal enterprise groups, and the process comprises field analysis and evaluation. Finally, industrial policies are proposed regarding the development of low-carbon coal conglomerate strategies and measures. This study aims mainly to guide the low-carbon development of coal enterprise groups, solve the problem of coal mining and the destruction of ecological environment, support the conservation of raw materials and various resources, and achieve the sustainable development of the coal industry.

Grindability measurements on low-rank fuels. [Prediction of large pulverizer performance from small scale test equipment

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Peipho, R.R.; Dougan, D.R.

1981-01-01

Experience has shown that the grinding characteristics of low rank coals are best determined by testing them in a pulverizer. Test results from a small MPS-32 Babcock and Wilcox pulverizer to predict large, full-scale pulverizer performance are presented. The MPS-32 apparatus, test procedure and evaluation of test results is described. The test data show that the Hardgrove apparatus and the ASTM test method must be used with great caution when considering low-rank fuels. The MPS-32 meets the needs for real-machine simulation but with some disadvantages. A smaller pulverizer is desirable. 1 ref.

REGULATION OF COAL POLYMER DEGRADATION BY FUNGI

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

John A. Bumpus

1998-11-30

A variety of lignin degrading fungi mediate solubilization and subsequent biodegradation of coal macromolecules (a.k.a. coal polymer) from highly oxidized low rank coals such as leonardites. It appears that oxalate or possibly other metal chelators (i.e., certain Krebs Cycle intermediates) mediate solubilization of low rank coals while extracellular oxidases have a role in subsequent oxidation of solubilized coal macromolecule. These processes are under nutritional control. For example, in the case of P. chrysosporium, solubilization of leonardite occurred when the fungi were cultured on most but not all nutrient agars tested and subsequent biodegradation occurred only in nutrient nitrogen limited cultures.more » Lignin peroxidases mediate oxidation of coal macromolecule in a reaction that is dependent on the presence of veratryl alcohol and hydrogen peroxide. Kinetic evidence suggests that veratryl alcohol is oxidized to the veratryl alcohol cation radical which then mediates oxidation of the coal macromolecule. Results by others suggest that Mn peroxidases mediate formation of reactive Mn{sup 3+} complexes which also mediate oxidation of coal macromolecule. A biomimetic approach was used to study solubilization of a North Dakota leonardite. It was found that a concentration {approximately}75 mM sodium oxalate was optimal for solubilization of this low rank coal. This is important because this is well above the concentration of oxalate produced by fungi in liquid culture. Higher local concentrations probably occur in solid agar cultures and thus may account for the observation that greater solubilization occurs in agar media relative to liquid media. The characteristics of biomimetically solubilized leonardite were similar to those of biologically solubilized leonardite. Perhaps our most interesting observation was that in addition to oxalate, other common Lewis bases (phosphate/hydrogen phosphate/dihydrogen phosphate and bicarbonate/carbonate ions) are able to

Coal Liquefaction desulfurization process

DOEpatents

Givens, Edwin N.

1983-01-01

In a solvent refined coal liquefaction process, more effective desulfurization of the high boiling point components is effected by first stripping the solvent-coal reacted slurry of lower boiling point components, particularly including hydrogen sulfide and low molecular weight sulfur compounds, and then reacting the slurry with a solid sulfur getter material, such as iron. The sulfur getter compound, with reacted sulfur included, is then removed with other solids in the slurry.

EXXON donor solvent coal liquefaction process

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Epperly, W. R.; Swabb, L. E., Jr.; Tauton, J. W.

1978-01-01

A solvent coal liquefaction process to produce low-sulfur liquid products from a wide range of coals is described. An integrated program of laboratory and engineering research and development in conjunction with operation of a 250 T/D pilot plant is discussed.

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Maa, Peter S.

1978-01-01

A process for liquefying a particulate coal feed to produce useful petroleum-like liquid products which comprises contacting; in a series of two or more coal liquefaction zones, or stages, graded with respect to temperature, an admixture of a polar compound; or compounds, a hydrogen donor solvent and particulate coal, the total effluent being passed in each instance from a low temperature zone, or stage to the next succeeding higher temperature zone, or stage, of the series. The temperature within the initial zone, or stage, of the series is maintained about 70.degree. F and 750.degree. F and the temperature within the final zone, or stage, is maintained between about 750.degree. F and 950.degree. F. The residence time within the first zone, or stage, ranges, generally, from about 20 to about 150 minutes and residence time within each of the remaining zones, or stages, of the series ranges, generally, from about 10 minutes to about 70 minutes. Further steps of the process include: separating the product from the liquefaction zone into fractions inclusive of a liquid solvent fraction; hydrotreating said liquid solvent fraction in a hydrogenation zone; and recycling the hydrogenated liquid solvent mixture to said coal liquefaction zones.

Process for coal liquefaction in staged dissolvers

DOEpatents

Roberts, George W.; Givens, Edwin N.; Skinner, Ronald W.

1983-01-01

There is described an improved liquefaction process by which coal is converted to a low ash and low sulfur carbonaceous material that can be used as a fuel in an environmentally acceptable manner without costly gas scrubbing equipment. In the process, coal is slurried with a pasting oil, passed through a preheater and at least two dissolvers in series in the presence of hydrogen-rich gases at elevated temperatures and pressures. Solids, including mineral ash and unconverted coal macerals, are separated from the condensed reactor effluent. In accordance with the improved process, the first dissolver is operated at a higher temperature than the second dissolver. This temperature sequence produces improved product selectivity and permits the incorporation of sufficient hydrogen in the solvent for adequate recycle operations.

Catalytic two-stage coal hydrogenation and hydroconversion process

DOEpatents

MacArthur, James B.; McLean, Joseph B.; Comolli, Alfred G.

1989-01-01

A process for two-stage catalytic hydrogenation and liquefaction of coal to produce increased yields of low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid and gas products. In the process, the particulate coal is slurried with a process-derived liquid solvent and fed at temperature below about 650.degree. F. into a first stage catalytic reaction zone operated at conditions which promote controlled rate liquefaction of the coal, while simultaneously hydrogenating the hydrocarbon recycle oils at conditions favoring hydrogenation reactions. The first stage reactor is maintained at 650.degree.-800.degree. F. temperature, 1000-4000 psig hydrogen partial pressure, and 10-60 lb coal/hr/ft.sup.3 reactor space velocity. The partially hydrogenated material from the first stage reaction zone is passed directly to the close-coupled second stage catalytic reaction zone maintained at a temperature at least about 25.degree. F. higher than for the first stage reactor and within a range of 750.degree.-875.degree. F. temperature for further hydrogenation and thermal hydroconversion reactions. By this process, the coal feed is successively catalytically hydrogenated and hydroconverted at selected conditions, which results in significantly increased yields of desirable low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid products and minimal production of undesirable residuum and unconverted coal and hydrocarbon gases, with use of less energy to obtain the low molecular weight products, while catalyst life is substantially increased.

Chemical vapor deposition: Stable carbons from low-rank coals

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sharma, R.K.; Kulas, R.W.; Olson, E.S.

1996-12-31

A chemical vapor deposition (CVD) technique has been used to increase the oxidative stability of activated carbons. Activated carbons prepared from Gascoyne lignite (North Dakota) by thermal or potassium hydroxide activations were subjected to BCI, in helium at 727{degrees}C with or without benzene for a limited period of time, followed by annealing in helium at 900{degrees}C for three days. Untreated and acid-washed coal samples were used to assess the magnitude of the effect of mineral matter in the coal on the boron coating. The oxidative stability of the boron-modified carbons was determined from the decomposition curves obtained from the thermogravimetricmore » analysis. Modification of the as-received, KOH-treated carbon yielded oxidatively stable carbons up to an initial temperature of 520{degrees}C, compared to about 350{degrees}C for the starting material. Similar results were obtained for the carbonized Gascoyne lignite. Sulfurous acid washing of the Gascoyne significantly enhanced the thermal stability (600{degrees}C) of the boron-modified carbon.« less

Regulation of coal polymer degradation by fungi. Eighth quarterly report, [January--March 1996

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Irvine, R.L.; Bumpus, J.A.

1996-07-28

Progress is reported on solubilization of low-rank coal by enzyme activity derived from Trametes versicolor or P. chrysosporium. Specifically during the reporting period efforts were directed towards the determining the effect of pH on solubilization of leonardite, the role of laccase in low coal solubilization and metabolism, the decolorization of soluble coal macromolecule by P. chrysosprium and T. versicolor in solid agar gel, and the solubilization of low rank coal in slurry cultures and solid phase reactors.

Process for coal liquefaction employing selective coal feed

DOEpatents

Hoover, David S.; Givens, Edwin N.

1983-01-01

An improved coal liquefaction process is provided whereby coal conversion is improved and yields of pentane soluble liquefaction products are increased. In this process, selected feed coal is pulverized and slurried with a process derived solvent, passed through a preheater and one or more dissolvers in the presence of hydrogen-rich gases at elevated temperatures and pressures, following which solids, including mineral ash and unconverted coal macerals, are separated from the condensed reactor effluent. The selected feed coals comprise washed coals having a substantial amount of mineral matter, preferably from about 25-75%, by weight, based upon run-of-mine coal, removed with at least 1.0% by weight of pyritic sulfur remaining and exhibiting vitrinite reflectance of less than about 0.70%.

Formulation of low solids coal water slurry from advanced coal cleaning waste fines

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Battista, J.J.; Morrison, J.L.; Lambert, A.

1997-07-01

GPU Genco, the New York State Electric and Gas Corporation (NYSEG), Penn State University and the Homer City Coal Processing Corporation are conducting characterization and formulation tests to determine the suitability of using minus 325 mesh coal waste fines as a low solids coal water slurry (CWS) co-firing fuel. The fine coal is contained in a centrifuge effluent stream at the recently modified Homer City Coal Preparation Plant. Recovering, thickening and then co-firing this material with pulverized coal is one means of alleviating a disposal problem and increasing the Btu recovery for the adjacent power plant. The project team ismore » currently proceeding with the design of a pilot scale system to formulate the effluent into a satisfactory co-firing fuel on a continuous basis for combustion testing at Seward Station. The ultimate goal is to burn the fuel at the pulverized coal units at the Homer City Generating Station. This paper presents the success to date of the slurry characterization and pilot scale design work. In addition, the paper will update GPU Genco`s current status for the low solids coal water slurry co-firing technology and will outline the company`s future plans for the technology.« less

Using ground and intact coal Samples to evaluate hydrocarbon fate during supercritical CO2 injection into coal beds: effects of particle size and coal moisture

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolak, Jon; Hackley, Paul C.; Ruppert, Leslie F.; Warwick, Peter D.; Burruss, Robert

2015-01-01

To investigate the potential for mobilizing organic compounds from coal beds during geologic carbon dioxide (CO2) storage (sequestration), a series of solvent extractions using dichloromethane (DCM) and using supercritical CO2 (40 °C and 10 MPa) were conducted on a set of coal samples collected from Louisiana and Ohio. The coal samples studied range in rank from lignite A to high volatile A bituminous, and were characterized using proximate, ultimate, organic petrography, and sorption isotherm analyses. Sorption isotherm analyses of gaseous CO2 and methane show a general increase in gas storage capacity with coal rank, consistent with findings from previous studies. In the solvent extractions, both dry, ground coal samples and moist, intact core plug samples were used to evaluate effects of variations in particle size and moisture content. Samples were spiked with perdeuterated surrogate compounds prior to extraction, and extracts were analyzed via gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. The DCM extracts generally contained the highest concentrations of organic compounds, indicating the existence of additional hydrocarbons within the coal matrix that were not mobilized during supercritical CO2 extractions. Concentrations of aliphatic and aromatic compounds measured in supercritical CO2 extracts of core plug samples generally are lower than concentrations in corresponding extracts of dry, ground coal samples, due to differences in particle size and moisture content. Changes in the amount of extracted compounds and in surrogate recovery measured during consecutive supercritical CO2extractions of core plug samples appear to reflect the transition from a water-wet to a CO2-wet system. Changes in coal core plug mass during supercritical CO2 extraction range from 3.4% to 14%, indicating that a substantial portion of coal moisture is retained in the low-rank coal samples. Moisture retention within core plug samples, especially in low-rank coals, appears to inhibit

Process for treating moisture laden coal fines

DOEpatents

Davis, Burl E.; Henry, Raymond M.; Trivett, Gordon S.; Albaugh, Edgar W.

1993-01-01

A process is provided for making a free flowing granular product from moisture laden caked coal fines, such as wet cake, by mixing a water immiscible substance, such as oil, with the caked coal, preferably under low shear forces for a period of time sufficient to produce a plurality of free flowing granules. Each granule is preferably comprised of a dry appearing admixture of one or more coal particle, 2-50% by weight water and the water immiscible substance.

Graphene quantum dots, graphene oxide, carbon quantum dots and graphite nanocrystals in coals

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dong, Yongqiang; Lin, Jianpeng; Chen, Yingmei; Fu, Fengfu; Chi, Yuwu; Chen, Guonan

2014-06-01

Six coal samples of different ranks have been used to prepare single-layer graphene quantum dots (S-GQDs). After chemical oxidation and a series of centrifugation separation, every coal could be treated into two fractions, namely, CoalA and CoalB. According to the characterization results of TEM, AFM, XRD, Raman and FTIR, CoalA was revealed to be mainly composed of S-GQDs, which have an average height of about 0.5 nm and an average plane dimension of about 10 nm. The obtained S-GQDs showed excitation-dependent fluorescence and excellent electrochemiluminescence. CoalB was found to be some other carbon-based nanomaterials (CNMs), including agglomerated GQDs, graphene oxide, carbon quantum dots and agglomerated carbon nanocrystals. Generally, low-ranked coals might be more suitable for the preparation of S-GQDs. The production yield of S-GQDs from the six investigated coals decreased from 56.30% to 14.66% when the coal rank increased gradually. In contrast, high-ranked coals had high production yield of CoalB and might be more suitable for preparing other CNMs that were contained in CoalB, although those CNMs were difficult to separate from each other in our experiment.Six coal samples of different ranks have been used to prepare single-layer graphene quantum dots (S-GQDs). After chemical oxidation and a series of centrifugation separation, every coal could be treated into two fractions, namely, CoalA and CoalB. According to the characterization results of TEM, AFM, XRD, Raman and FTIR, CoalA was revealed to be mainly composed of S-GQDs, which have an average height of about 0.5 nm and an average plane dimension of about 10 nm. The obtained S-GQDs showed excitation-dependent fluorescence and excellent electrochemiluminescence. CoalB was found to be some other carbon-based nanomaterials (CNMs), including agglomerated GQDs, graphene oxide, carbon quantum dots and agglomerated carbon nanocrystals. Generally, low-ranked coals might be more suitable for the preparation of

Bio-coal briquettes using low-grade coal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Estiaty, L. M.; Fatimah, D.; Widodo

2018-02-01

The technology in using briquettes for fuel has been widely used in many countries for both domestic and industrial purposes. Common types of briquette used are coal, peat, charcoal, and biomass. Several researches have been carried out in regards to the production and the use of briquettes. Recently, researches show that mixing coal and biomass will result in an environmentally friendly briquette with better combustion and physical characteristics. This type of briquette is known as bio-coal briquettes. Bio-coal briquettes are made from agriculture waste and coal, which are readily available, cheap and affordable. Researchers make these bio-coal briquettes with different aims and objectives, depending on the issues to address, e.g. utilizing agricultural waste as an alternative energy to replace fossil fuels that are depleting its reserves, adding coal to biomass in order to add calorific value to bio-coal briquette, and adding biomass to coal to improve its chemical and physical properties. In our research, biocoal briquettes are made to utilize low grade coal. The biomass we use, however, is different from the ones used in past researches because it has undergone fermentation. The benefits of using such biomass are 1. Fermentation turns the hemi cellulose into a simpler form, so that the burning activation energy decreases while the calorific value increases. 2. Enzym produced will bind to heavy metals from coal as co-factors, forming metals that are environmentally friendly.

Comprehensive Fractal Description of Porosity of Coal of Different Ranks

PubMed Central

Ren, Jiangang; Zhang, Guocheng; Song, Zhimin; Liu, Gaofeng; Li, Bing

2014-01-01

We selected, as the objects of our research, lignite from the Beizao Mine, gas coal from the Caiyuan Mine, coking coal from the Xiqu Mine, and anthracite from the Guhanshan Mine. We used the mercury intrusion method and the low-temperature liquid nitrogen adsorption method to analyze the structure and shape of the coal pores and calculated the fractal dimensions of different aperture segments in the coal. The experimental results show that the fractal dimension of the aperture segment of lignite, gas coal, and coking coal with an aperture of greater than or equal to 10 nm, as well as the fractal dimension of the aperture segment of anthracite with an aperture of greater than or equal to 100 nm, can be calculated using the mercury intrusion method; the fractal dimension of the coal pore, with an aperture range between 2.03 nm and 361.14 nm, can be calculated using the liquid nitrogen adsorption method, of which the fractal dimensions bounded by apertures of 10 nm and 100 nm are different. Based on these findings, we defined and calculated the comprehensive fractal dimensions of the coal pores and achieved the unity of fractal dimensions for full apertures of coal pores, thereby facilitating, overall characterization for the heterogeneity of the coal pore structure. PMID:24955407

Process for converting heavy oil deposited on coal to distillable oil in a low severity process

DOEpatents

Ignasiak, Teresa; Strausz, Otto; Ignasiak, Boleslaw; Janiak, Jerzy; Pawlak, Wanda; Szymocha, Kazimierz; Turak, Ali A.

1994-01-01

A process for removing oil from coal fines that have been agglomerated or blended with heavy oil comprises the steps of heating the coal fines to temperatures over 350.degree. C. up to 450.degree. C. in an inert atmosphere, such as steam or nitrogen, to convert some of the heavy oil to lighter, and distilling and collecting the lighter oils. The pressure at which the process is carried out can be from atmospheric to 100 atmospheres. A hydrogen donor can be added to the oil prior to deposition on the coal surface to increase the yield of distillable oil.

Coal liquefaction quenching process

DOEpatents

Thorogood, Robert M.; Yeh, Chung-Liang; Donath, Ernest E.

1983-01-01

There is described an improved coal liquefaction quenching process which prevents the formation of coke with a minimum reduction of thermal efficiency of the coal liquefaction process. In the process, the rapid cooling of the liquid/solid products of the coal liquefaction reaction is performed without the cooling of the associated vapor stream to thereby prevent formation of coke and the occurrence of retrograde reactions. The rapid cooling is achieved by recycling a subcooled portion of the liquid/solid mixture to the lower section of a phase separator that separates the vapor from the liquid/solid products leaving the coal reactor.

Influence of the microwave irradiation dewatering on the combustion characteristics of Chinese brown coals

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ge, Lichao; Feng, Hongcui; Xu, Chang; Zhang, Yanwei; Wang, Zhihua

2018-02-01

This study investigates the influence of microwave irradiation on coal composition, pore structure, coal rank, and combustion characteristics of typical brown coals in China. Results show that the upgrading process significantly decreased the inherent moisture, and increased calorific value and fixed carbon content. After upgrading, pore distribution extended to micropore region, oxygen functional groups were reduced and destroyed, and the apparent aromaticity increased suggesting an improvement in the coal rank. Based on thermogravimetric analysis, the combustion processes of upgraded coals were delayed toward the high temperature region, and the temperatures of ignition, peak and burnout increased. Based on the average combustion rate and comprehensive combustion parameter, the upgraded coals performed better compared with raw brown coals and a high rank coal. In ignition and burnout segments, the activation energy increased but exhibited a decrease in the combustion stage.

Geochemistry and petrology of selected coal samples from Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and Papua, Indonesia

USGS Publications Warehouse

Belkin, H.E.; Tewalt, S.J.; Hower, J.C.; Stucker, J.D.; O'Keefe, J.M.K.

2009-01-01

Indonesia has become the world's largest exporter of thermal coal and is a major supplier to the Asian coal market, particularly as the People's Republic of China is now (2007) and perhaps may remain a net importer of coal. Indonesia has had a long history of coal production, mainly in Sumatra and Kalimantan, but only in the last two decades have government and commercial forces resulted in a remarkable coal boom. A recent assessment of Indonesian coal-bed methane (CBM) potential has motivated active CBM exploration. Most of the coal is Paleogene and Neogene, low to moderate rank and has low ash yield and sulfur (generally < 10 and < 1??wt.%, respectively). Active tectonic and igneous activity has resulted in significant rank increase in some coal basins. Eight coal samples are described that represent the major export and/or resource potential of Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and Papua. Detailed geochemistry, including proximate and ultimate analysis, sulfur forms, and major, minor, and trace element determinations are presented. Organic petrology and vitrinite reflectance data reflect various precursor flora assemblages and rank variations, including sample composites from active igneous and tectonic areas. A comparison of Hazardous Air Pollutants (HAPs) elements abundance with world and US averages show that the Indonesian coals have low combustion pollution potential.

Low-ranking female Japanese macaques make efforts for social grooming

PubMed Central

Kurihara, Yosuke

2016-01-01

Abstract Grooming is essential to build social relationships in primates. Its importance is universal among animals from different ranks; however, rank-related differences in feeding patterns can lead to conflicts between feeding and grooming in low-ranking animals. Unifying the effects of dominance rank on feeding and grooming behaviors contributes to revealing the importance of grooming. Here, I tested whether the grooming behavior of low-ranking females were similar to that of high-ranking females despite differences in their feeding patterns. I followed 9 Japanese macaques Macaca fuscata fuscata adult females from the Arashiyama group, and analyzed the feeding patterns and grooming behaviors of low- and high-ranking females. Low-ranking females fed on natural foods away from the provisioning site, whereas high-ranking females obtained more provisioned food at the site. Due to these differences in feeding patterns, low-ranking females spent less time grooming than high-ranking females. However, both low- and high-ranking females performed grooming around the provisioning site, which was linked to the number of neighboring individuals for low-ranking females and feeding on provisioned foods at the site for high-ranking females. The similarity in grooming area led to a range and diversity of grooming partners that did not differ with rank. Thus, low-ranking females can obtain small amounts of provisioned foods and perform grooming with as many partners around the provisioning site as high-ranking females. These results highlight the efforts made by low-ranking females to perform grooming and suggest the importance of grooming behavior in group-living primates. PMID:29491896

Low-ranking female Japanese macaques make efforts for social grooming.

PubMed

Kurihara, Yosuke

2016-04-01

Grooming is essential to build social relationships in primates. Its importance is universal among animals from different ranks; however, rank-related differences in feeding patterns can lead to conflicts between feeding and grooming in low-ranking animals. Unifying the effects of dominance rank on feeding and grooming behaviors contributes to revealing the importance of grooming. Here, I tested whether the grooming behavior of low-ranking females were similar to that of high-ranking females despite differences in their feeding patterns. I followed 9 Japanese macaques Macaca fuscata fuscata adult females from the Arashiyama group, and analyzed the feeding patterns and grooming behaviors of low- and high-ranking females. Low-ranking females fed on natural foods away from the provisioning site, whereas high-ranking females obtained more provisioned food at the site. Due to these differences in feeding patterns, low-ranking females spent less time grooming than high-ranking females. However, both low- and high-ranking females performed grooming around the provisioning site, which was linked to the number of neighboring individuals for low-ranking females and feeding on provisioned foods at the site for high-ranking females. The similarity in grooming area led to a range and diversity of grooming partners that did not differ with rank. Thus, low-ranking females can obtain small amounts of provisioned foods and perform grooming with as many partners around the provisioning site as high-ranking females. These results highlight the efforts made by low-ranking females to perform grooming and suggest the importance of grooming behavior in group-living primates.

Learning Efficient Sparse and Low Rank Models.

PubMed

Sprechmann, P; Bronstein, A M; Sapiro, G

2015-09-01

Parsimony, including sparsity and low rank, has been shown to successfully model data in numerous machine learning and signal processing tasks. Traditionally, such modeling approaches rely on an iterative algorithm that minimizes an objective function with parsimony-promoting terms. The inherently sequential structure and data-dependent complexity and latency of iterative optimization constitute a major limitation in many applications requiring real-time performance or involving large-scale data. Another limitation encountered by these modeling techniques is the difficulty of their inclusion in discriminative learning scenarios. In this work, we propose to move the emphasis from the model to the pursuit algorithm, and develop a process-centric view of parsimonious modeling, in which a learned deterministic fixed-complexity pursuit process is used in lieu of iterative optimization. We show a principled way to construct learnable pursuit process architectures for structured sparse and robust low rank models, derived from the iteration of proximal descent algorithms. These architectures learn to approximate the exact parsimonious representation at a fraction of the complexity of the standard optimization methods. We also show that appropriate training regimes allow to naturally extend parsimonious models to discriminative settings. State-of-the-art results are demonstrated on several challenging problems in image and audio processing with several orders of magnitude speed-up compared to the exact optimization algorithms.

Microbial conversion of low-rank coal: characterization of biodegraded product

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Wilson, B.W.; Bean, R.M.; Franz, J.A.

The authors have characterized products obtained from the action of the fungus Polyporus versicolor on oxidized North Dakota (ND) lignite. These analyses showed that, compared to feed coal, the bioconverted materials had higher hydrogen:carbon and oxygen:carbon ratios, but were proportionately lower in aliphatic hydrogen, as determined by infrared (IR) spectroscopy. The acid-precipitated extract was dissolved in dilute base and analyzed by /sup 13/C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Of the 60% of the carbon accounted for, approximately 51% of the carbon atoms were aromatic, 20% were assigned to carboxylic acid groups, and the remainder were aliphatic carbon. Proton NMR spectramore » of the acid-precipitated material revealed approximately equal proportions of aromatic and aliphatic hydrogen. The bioconverted materials were highly polar and exhibited a wide range in apparent molecular weight; most material was over 10,000 Da at acidic pH, as determined by ultrafiltration experiments. Freeze-dried product material was soluble in water but was essentially insoluble in other organic solvents. Calorimetric measurements on samples of the freeze-dried extract showed that, on a per-weight basis, it retained 94-97% of the heating value of the feed coal. 12 references, 5 figures, 2 tables.« less

Geochemical Proxies for Enhanced Process Control of Underground Coal Gasification

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kronimus, A.; Koenen, M.; David, P.; Veld, H.; van Dijk, A.; van Bergen, F.

2009-04-01

Underground coal gasification (UCG) represents a strategy targeting at syngas production for fuel or power generation from in-situ coal seams. It is a promising technique for exploiting coal deposits as an energy source at locations not allowing conventional mining under economic conditions. Although the underlying concept has already been suggested in 1868 and has been later on implemented in a number of field trials and even at a commercial scale, UCG is still facing technological barriers, impeding its widespread application. Field UCG operations rely on injection wells enabling the ignition of the target seam and the supply with oxidants (air, O2) inducing combustion (oxidative conditions). The combustion process delivers the enthalpy required for endothermic hydrogen production under reduction prone conditions in some distance to the injection point. The produced hydrogen - usually accompanied by organic and inorganic carbon species, e.g. CH4, CO, and CO2 - can then be retrieved through a production well. In contrast to gasification of mined coal in furnaces, it is difficult to measure the combustion temperature directly during UCG operations. It is already known that geochemical parameters such as the relative production gas composition as well as its stable isotope signature are related to the combustion temperature and, consequently, can be used as temperature proxies. However, so far the general applicability of such relations has not been proven. In order to get corresponding insights with respect to coals of significantly different rank and origin, four powdered coal samples covering maturities ranging from Ro= 0.43% (lignite) to Ro= 3.39% (anthracite) have been gasified in laboratory experiments. The combustion temperature has been varied between 350 and 900 ˚ C, respectively. During gasification, the generated gas has been captured in a cryo-trap, dried and the carbon containing gas components have been catalytically oxidized to CO2. Thereafter, the

Effects of temperature and glucose limitation on coal solubilization by Candida ML13

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Evans, B.

1991-04-01

Biological processing has received considerable attention in recent years as a technology for the utilization of low-ranked coals. Several fungi and actinomycetes have been shown to liquefy highly oxidized coal in pure culture under aerobic conditions. This report describes the optimization of cultural conditions for coal solubilization by Candida sp. ML13, an organism originally isolated from a naturally weathered coal seam. Coal solubilization by surface cultures of Candida sp. has previously been demonstrated. The author describes here the elicitation of the activity in submerged cultures as well as the effect of carbohydrate concentration, carbon source, temperature, and agitation rate onmore » coal solubilization by this organism.« less

Low rank magnetic resonance fingerprinting.

PubMed

Mazor, Gal; Weizman, Lior; Tal, Assaf; Eldar, Yonina C

2016-08-01

Magnetic Resonance Fingerprinting (MRF) is a relatively new approach that provides quantitative MRI using randomized acquisition. Extraction of physical quantitative tissue values is preformed off-line, based on acquisition with varying parameters and a dictionary generated according to the Bloch equations. MRF uses hundreds of radio frequency (RF) excitation pulses for acquisition, and therefore high under-sampling ratio in the sampling domain (k-space) is required. This under-sampling causes spatial artifacts that hamper the ability to accurately estimate the quantitative tissue values. In this work, we introduce a new approach for quantitative MRI using MRF, called Low Rank MRF. We exploit the low rank property of the temporal domain, on top of the well-known sparsity of the MRF signal in the generated dictionary domain. We present an iterative scheme that consists of a gradient step followed by a low rank projection using the singular value decomposition. Experiments on real MRI data demonstrate superior results compared to conventional implementation of compressed sensing for MRF at 15% sampling ratio.

Coal liquefaction process utilizing coal/CO.sub.2 slurry feedstream

DOEpatents

Comolli, Alfred G.; McLean, Joseph B.

1989-01-01

A coal hydrogenation and liquefaction process in which particulate coal feed is pressurized to an intermediate pressure of at least 500 psig and slurried with CO.sub.2 liquid to provide a flowable coal/CO.sub.2 slurry feedstream, which is further pressurized to at least 1000 psig and fed into a catalytic reactor. The coal particle size is 50-375 mesh (U.S. Sieve Series) and provides 50-80 W % coal in the coal/CO.sub.2 slurry feedstream. Catalytic reaction conditions are maintained at 650.degree.-850.degree. F. temperature, 1000-4000 psig hydrogen partial pressure and coal feed rate of 10-100 lb coal/hr ft.sup.3 reactor volume to produce hydrocarbon gas and liquid products. The hydrogen and CO.sub.2 are recovered from the reactor effluent gaseous fraction, hydrogen is recycled to the catalytic reactor, and CO.sub.2 is liquefied and recycled to the coal slurrying step. If desired, two catalytic reaction stages close coupled together in series relation can be used. The process advantageously minimizes the recycle and processing of excess hydrocarbon liquid previously needed for slurrying the coal feed to the reactor(s).

Formation and retention of methane in coal

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hucka, V.J.; Bodily, D.M.; Huang, H.

1992-05-15

The formation and retention of methane in coalbeds was studied for ten Utah coal samples, one Colorado coal sample and eight coal samples from the Argonne Premium Coal Sample Bank.Methane gas content of the Utah and Colorado coals varied from zero to 9 cm{sup 3}/g. The Utah coals were all high volatile bituminous coals. The Colorado coal was a gassy medium volatile bituminous coal. The Argonne coals cover a range or rank from lignite to low volatile bituminous coal and were used to determine the effect of rank in laboratory studies. The methane content of six selected Utah coal seamsmore » and the Colorado coal seam was measured in situ using a special sample collection device and a bubble desorbometer. Coal samples were collected at each measurement site for laboratory analysis. The cleat and joint system was evaluated for the coal and surrounding rocks and geological conditions were noted. Permeability measurements were performed on selected samples and all samples were analyzed for proximate and ultimate analysis, petrographic analysis, {sup 13}C NMR dipolar-dephasing spectroscopy, and density analysis. The observed methane adsorption behavior was correlated with the chemical structure and physical properties of the coals.« less

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Skinner, Ronald W.; Tao, John C.; Znaimer, Samuel

1985-01-01

This invention relates to an improved process for the production of liquid carbonaceous fuels and solvents from carbonaceous solid fuels, especially coal. The claimed improved process includes the hydrocracking of the light SRC mixed with a suitable hydrocracker solvent. The recycle of the resulting hydrocracked product, after separation and distillation, is used to produce a solvent for the hydrocracking of the light solvent refined coal.

Using coal inside California for electric power

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moore, J. B.

1978-01-01

In a detailed analysis performed at Southern California Edison on a wide variety of technologies, the direct combustion of coal and medium BTU gas from coal were ranked just below nuclear power for future nonpetroleum based electric power generation. As a result, engineering studies were performed for demonstration projects for the direct combustion of coal and medium BTU gas from coal. Graphs are presented for power demand, and power cost. Direct coal combustion and coal gasification processes are presented.

Process for improving soluble coal yield in a coal deashing process

DOEpatents

Rhodes, Donald E.

1980-01-01

Coal liquefaction products are contacted with a deashing solvent and introduced into a first separation zone. The first separation zone is maintained at an elevated temperature and pressure, determined to maximize the recovery of soluble coal products, to cause said coal liquefaction products to separate into a first light phase and a first heavy phase. Under these conditions the heavy phase while still fluid-like in character is substantially non-flowable. Flowability is returned to the fluid-like heavy phase by the introduction of an additional quantity of deashing solvent into the first separation zone at a location below the interface between the first light and heavy phases or into the heavy phase withdrawal conduit during withdrawal of the first heavy phase and prior to any substantial pressure reduction. The first heavy phase then is withdrawn from the first separation zone for additional downstream processing without plugging either the withdrawal conduit or the downstream apparatus. The first light phase comprising the soluble coal products is withdrawn and recovered in an increased yield to provide a more economical coal deashing process.

Fuel Characterization of Newly Discovered Nigerian Coals

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bevan Nyakuma, Bemgba; Oladokun, Olagoke; Jauro, Aliyu; Damian Nyakuma, Denen

2017-07-01

This study seeks to characterize and highlight the fuel properties, rank, and classification of coals from Ihioma (IHM) and Ogboligbo (OGB) in Imo and Kogi states of Nigeria, respectively. The fuel properties were examined based on ultimate, proximate, and bomb calorific analyses. The results indicated that IHM coal contains comparatively higher C and H but lower O, N, and S content than OGB. In addition, the nitrogen (N) and sulphur (S) content for both coal samples were above 0.7 wt.% and 1.5 wt.%, respectively, which indicates high potential for pollutant emissions. Furthermore, the coal proximate properties were below 5 wt.% for Moisture; Volatiles (70 wt.%); Fixed Carbon (45 wt.%) and Ash (2.5 wt.%) on average. IHM coal has an HHV of 19.40 MJ/kg whereas OGB is 15.55 MJ/kg. This is due to the low carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and high oxygen (O) content in OGB whereas IHM contains higher VM and HHV. Furthermore, OGB presents better handling, storage, and transport potential. Furthermore, OGB has a higher fuel ratio and value index due to lower moisture, ash content, and volatiles. Based on the ASTM D388 standard, the coals were classified as Lignite (Brown) Low-Rank Coals (LRCs) with potential for energy recovery.

Coal liquefaction process with enhanced process solvent

DOEpatents

Givens, Edwin N.; Kang, Dohee

1984-01-01

In an improved coal liquefaction process, including a critical solvent deashing stage, high value product recovery is improved and enhanced process-derived solvent is provided by recycling second separator underflow in the critical solvent deashing stage to the coal slurry mix, for inclusion in the process solvent pool.

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Karr, Jr., Clarence

1977-04-19

An improved coal liquefaction process is provided which enables conversion of a coal-oil slurry to a synthetic crude refinable to produce larger yields of gasoline and diesel oil. The process is characterized by a two-step operation applied to the slurry prior to catalytic desulfurization and hydrogenation in which the slurry undergoes partial hydrogenation to crack and hydrogenate asphaltenes and the partially hydrogenated slurry is filtered to remove minerals prior to subsequent catalytic hydrogenation.

Adjoints and Low-rank Covariance Representation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tippett, Michael K.; Cohn, Stephen E.

2000-01-01

Quantitative measures of the uncertainty of Earth System estimates can be as important as the estimates themselves. Second moments of estimation errors are described by the covariance matrix, whose direct calculation is impractical when the number of degrees of freedom of the system state is large. Ensemble and reduced-state approaches to prediction and data assimilation replace full estimation error covariance matrices by low-rank approximations. The appropriateness of such approximations depends on the spectrum of the full error covariance matrix, whose calculation is also often impractical. Here we examine the situation where the error covariance is a linear transformation of a forcing error covariance. We use operator norms and adjoints to relate the appropriateness of low-rank representations to the conditioning of this transformation. The analysis is used to investigate low-rank representations of the steady-state response to random forcing of an idealized discrete-time dynamical system.

Coal Producer's Rubber Waste Processing Development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Makarevich, Evgeniya; Papin, Andrey; Nevedrov, Alexander; Cherkasova, Tatyana; Ignatova, Alla

2017-11-01

A large amount of rubber-containing waste, the bulk of which are worn automobile tires and conveyor belts, is produced at coal mining and coal processing enterprises using automobile tires, conveyor belts, etc. The volume of waste generated increases every year and reaches enormous proportions. The methods for processing rubber waste can be divided into three categories: grinding, pyrolysis (high and low temperature), and decomposition by means of chemical solvents. One of the known techniques of processing the worn-out tires is their regeneration, aimed at producing the new rubber substitute used in the production of rubber goods. However, the number of worn tires used for the production of regenerate does not exceed 20% of their total quantity. The new method for processing rubber waste through the pyrolysis process is considered in this article. Experimental data on the upgrading of the carbon residue of pyrolysis by the methods of heavy media separation, magnetic and vibroseparation, and thermal processing are presented.

Low-rank structure learning via nonconvex heuristic recovery.

PubMed

Deng, Yue; Dai, Qionghai; Liu, Risheng; Zhang, Zengke; Hu, Sanqing

2013-03-01

In this paper, we propose a nonconvex framework to learn the essential low-rank structure from corrupted data. Different from traditional approaches, which directly utilizes convex norms to measure the sparseness, our method introduces more reasonable nonconvex measurements to enhance the sparsity in both the intrinsic low-rank structure and the sparse corruptions. We will, respectively, introduce how to combine the widely used ℓp norm (0 < p < 1) and log-sum term into the framework of low-rank structure learning. Although the proposed optimization is no longer convex, it still can be effectively solved by a majorization-minimization (MM)-type algorithm, with which the nonconvex objective function is iteratively replaced by its convex surrogate and the nonconvex problem finally falls into the general framework of reweighed approaches. We prove that the MM-type algorithm can converge to a stationary point after successive iterations. The proposed model is applied to solve two typical problems: robust principal component analysis and low-rank representation. Experimental results on low-rank structure learning demonstrate that our nonconvex heuristic methods, especially the log-sum heuristic recovery algorithm, generally perform much better than the convex-norm-based method (0 < p < 1) for both data with higher rank and with denser corruptions.

Continuous coal processing method

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ryason, P. R. (Inventor)

1980-01-01

A coal pump is provided in which solid coal is heated in the barrel of an extruder under pressure to a temperature at which the coal assumes plastic properties. The coal is continuously extruded, without static zones, using, for example, screw extrusion preferably without venting through a reduced diameter die to form a dispersed spray. As a result, the dispersed coal may be continuously injected into vessels or combustors at any pressure up to the maximum pressure developed in the extrusion device. The coal may be premixed with other materials such as desulfurization aids or reducible metal ores so that reactions occur, during or after conversion to its plastic state. Alternatively, the coal may be processed and caused to react after extrusion, through the die, with, for example, liquid oxidizers, whereby a coal reactor is provided.

Nonconvex Nonsmooth Low Rank Minimization via Iteratively Reweighted Nuclear Norm.

PubMed

Lu, Canyi; Tang, Jinhui; Yan, Shuicheng; Lin, Zhouchen

2016-02-01

The nuclear norm is widely used as a convex surrogate of the rank function in compressive sensing for low rank matrix recovery with its applications in image recovery and signal processing. However, solving the nuclear norm-based relaxed convex problem usually leads to a suboptimal solution of the original rank minimization problem. In this paper, we propose to use a family of nonconvex surrogates of L0-norm on the singular values of a matrix to approximate the rank function. This leads to a nonconvex nonsmooth minimization problem. Then, we propose to solve the problem by an iteratively re-weighted nuclear norm (IRNN) algorithm. IRNN iteratively solves a weighted singular value thresholding problem, which has a closed form solution due to the special properties of the nonconvex surrogate functions. We also extend IRNN to solve the nonconvex problem with two or more blocks of variables. In theory, we prove that the IRNN decreases the objective function value monotonically, and any limit point is a stationary point. Extensive experiments on both synthesized data and real images demonstrate that IRNN enhances the low rank matrix recovery compared with the state-of-the-art convex algorithms.

Enhanced Combustion Low NOx Pulverized Coal Burner

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

David Towle; Richard Donais; Todd Hellewell

2007-06-30

For more than two decades, Alstom Power Inc. (Alstom) has developed a range of low cost, infurnace technologies for NOx emissions control for the domestic U.S. pulverized coal fired boiler market. This includes Alstom's internally developed TFS 2000{trademark} firing system, and various enhancements to it developed in concert with the U.S. Department of Energy. As of the date of this report, more than 270 units representing approximately 80,000 MWe of domestic coal fired capacity have been retrofit with Alstom low NOx technology. Best of class emissions range from 0.18 lb/MMBtu for bituminous coal to 0.10 lb/MMBtu for subbituminous coal, withmore » typical levels at 0.24 lb/MMBtu and 0.13 lb/MMBtu, respectively. Despite these gains, NOx emissions limits in the U.S. continue to ratchet down for new and existing boiler equipment. On March 10, 2005, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR). CAIR requires 25 Eastern states to reduce NOx emissions from the power generation sector by 1.7 million tons in 2009 and 2.0 million tons by 2015. Low cost solutions to meet such regulations, and in particular those that can avoid the need for a costly selective catalytic reduction system (SCR), provide a strong incentive to continue to improve low NOx firing system technology to meet current and anticipated NOx control regulations. The overall objective of the work is to develop an enhanced combustion, low NOx pulverized coal burner, which, when integrated with Alstom's state-of-the-art, globally air staged low NOx firing systems will provide a means to achieve: Less than 0.15 lb/MMBtu NOx emissions when firing a high volatile Eastern or Western bituminous coal, Less than 0.10 lb/MMBtu NOx emissions when firing a subbituminous coal, NOx reduction costs at least 25% lower than the costs of an SCR, Validation of the NOx control technology developed through large (15 MWt) pilot scale demonstration, and Documentation required for

Iron catalyzed coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Garg, Diwakar; Givens, Edwin N.

1983-01-01

A process is described for the solvent refining of coal into a gas product, a liquid product and a normally solid dissolved product. Particulate coal and a unique co-catalyst system are suspended in a coal solvent and processed in a coal liquefaction reactor, preferably an ebullated bed reactor. The co-catalyst system comprises a combination of a stoichiometric excess of iron oxide and pyrite which reduce predominantly to active iron sulfide catalysts in the reaction zone. This catalyst system results in increased catalytic activity with attendant improved coal conversion and enhanced oil product distribution as well as reduced sulfide effluent. Iron oxide is used in a stoichiometric excess of that required to react with sulfur indigenous to the feed coal and that produced during reduction of the pyrite catalyst to iron sulfide.

Experimental evaluation of main emissions during coal processing waste combustion.

PubMed

Dmitrienko, Margarita A; Legros, Jean C; Strizhak, Pavel A

2018-02-01

The total volume of the coal processing wastes (filter cakes) produced by Russia, China, and India is as high as dozens of millions of tons per year. The concentrations of CO and CO 2 in the emissions from the combustion of filter cakes have been measured directly for the first time. They are the biggest volume of coal processing wastes. There have been many discussions about using these wastes as primary or secondary components of coal-water slurries (CWS) and coal-water slurries containing petrochemicals (CWSP). Boilers have already been operationally tested in Russia for the combustion of CWSP based on filter cakes. In this work, the concentrations of hazardous emissions have been measured at temperatures ranging from 500 to 1000°С. The produced CO and CO 2 concentrations are shown to be practically constant at high temperatures (over 900°С) for all the coal processing wastes under study. Experiments have shown the feasibility to lowering the combustion temperatures of coal processing wastes down to 750-850°С. This provides sustainable combustion and reduces the CO and CO 2 emissions 1.2-1.7 times. These relatively low temperatures ensure satisfactory environmental and energy performance of combustion. Using CWS and CWSP instead of conventional solid fuels significantly reduces NO x and SO x emissions but leaves CO and CO 2 emissions practically at the same level as coal powder combustion. Therefore, the environmentally friendly future (in terms of all the main atmospheric emissions: CO, CO 2 , NO x , and SO x ) of both CWS and CWSP technologies relies on low-temperature combustion. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Carr, Norman L.; Moon, William G.; Prudich, Michael E.

1983-01-01

A C.sub.5 -900.degree. F. (C.sub.5 -482.degree. C.) liquid yield greater than 50 weight percent MAF feed coal is obtained in a coal liquefaction process wherein a selected combination of higher hydrogen partial pressure, longer slurry residence time and increased recycle ash content of the feed slurry are controlled within defined ranges.

Nitrogen in Chinese coals

USGS Publications Warehouse

Wu, D.; Lei, J.; Zheng, B.; Tang, X.; Wang, M.; Hu, Jiawen; Li, S.; Wang, B.; Finkelman, R.B.

2011-01-01

Three hundred and six coal samples were taken from main coal mines of twenty-six provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities in China, according to the resource distribution and coal-forming periods as well as the coal ranks and coal yields. Nitrogen was determined by using the Kjeldahl method at U. S. Geological Survey (USGS), which exhibit a normal frequency distribution. The nitrogen contents of over 90% Chinese coal vary from 0.52% to 1.41% and the average nitrogen content is recommended to be 0.98%. Nitrogen in coal exists primarily in organic form. There is a slight positive relationship between nitrogen content and coal ranking. ?? 2011 Science Press, Institute of Geochemistry, CAS and Springer Berlin Heidelberg.

Tensor Factorization for Low-Rank Tensor Completion.

PubMed

Zhou, Pan; Lu, Canyi; Lin, Zhouchen; Zhang, Chao

2018-03-01

Recently, a tensor nuclear norm (TNN) based method was proposed to solve the tensor completion problem, which has achieved state-of-the-art performance on image and video inpainting tasks. However, it requires computing tensor singular value decomposition (t-SVD), which costs much computation and thus cannot efficiently handle tensor data, due to its natural large scale. Motivated by TNN, we propose a novel low-rank tensor factorization method for efficiently solving the 3-way tensor completion problem. Our method preserves the low-rank structure of a tensor by factorizing it into the product of two tensors of smaller sizes. In the optimization process, our method only needs to update two smaller tensors, which can be more efficiently conducted than computing t-SVD. Furthermore, we prove that the proposed alternating minimization algorithm can converge to a Karush-Kuhn-Tucker point. Experimental results on the synthetic data recovery, image and video inpainting tasks clearly demonstrate the superior performance and efficiency of our developed method over state-of-the-arts including the TNN and matricization methods.

Relationship between weathered coal deposits and the etiology of Balkan endemic nephropathy

USGS Publications Warehouse

Feder, G.L.; Radovanovic, Z.; Finkelman, R.B.

1991-01-01

Field studies in epidemiology and environmental geochemistry in areas in Yugoslavia containing villages with a high incidence of Balkan endemic nephropathy (BEN), indicate a possible relationship between the presence of low-rank coal deposits and the etiology of BEN. Preliminary results from qualitative chemical analyses of drinking water from shallow farm wells indicate the presence of soluble polar aromatic and polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons. These compounds may be derived from weathering of low-rank coals occurring in the vicinity of the endemic villages. All of the endemic villages are in alluvial valleys of tributaries to the Danube River. All except one of the clusters of endemic villages are located in the vicinity of known Pliocene age coals. Detailed sampling of the drinking waters and the nearby coals are being undertaken to identify a possible etiologic factor.

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Wright, C.H.

1986-02-11

A process is described for the liquefaction of coal wherein raw feed coal is dissolved in recycle solvent with a slurry containing recycle coal minerals in the presence of added hydrogen at elevated temperature and pressure. The highest boiling distillable dissolved liquid fraction is obtained from a vacuum distillation zone and is entirely recycled to extinction. Lower boiling distillable dissolved liquid is removed in vapor phase from the dissolver zone and passed without purification and essentially without reduction in pressure to a catalytic hydrogenation zone where it is converted to an essentially colorless liquid product boiling in the transportation fuel range. 1 fig.

Coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Wright, Charles H.

1986-01-01

A process for the liquefaction of coal wherein raw feed coal is dissolved in recycle solvent with a slurry containing recycle coal minerals in the presence of added hydrogen at elevated temperature and pressure. The highest boiling distillable dissolved liquid fraction is obtained from a vacuum distillation zone and is entirely recycled to extinction. Lower boiling distillable dissolved liquid is removed in vapor phase from the dissolver zone and passed without purification and essentially without reduction in pressure to a catalytic hydrogenation zone where it is converted to an essentially colorless liquid product boiling in the transportation fuel range.

Process for electrochemically gasifying coal

DOEpatents

Botts, T.E.; Powell, J.R.

1985-10-25

A process is claimed for electrochemically gasifying coal by establishing a flowing stream of coal particulate slurry, electrolyte and electrode members through a transverse magnetic field that has sufficient strength to polarize the electrode members, thereby causing them to operate in combination with the electrolyte to electrochemically reduce the coal particulate in the slurry. Such electrochemical reduction of the coal produces hydrogen and carbon dioxide at opposite ends of the polarized electrode members. Gas collection means are operated in conjunction with the process to collect the evolved gases as they rise from the slurry and electrolyte solution. 7 figs.

Formation and retention of methane in coal. Final report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hucka, V.J.; Bodily, D.M.; Huang, H.

1992-05-15

The formation and retention of methane in coalbeds was studied for ten Utah coal samples, one Colorado coal sample and eight coal samples from the Argonne Premium Coal Sample Bank.Methane gas content of the Utah and Colorado coals varied from zero to 9 cm{sup 3}/g. The Utah coals were all high volatile bituminous coals. The Colorado coal was a gassy medium volatile bituminous coal. The Argonne coals cover a range or rank from lignite to low volatile bituminous coal and were used to determine the effect of rank in laboratory studies. The methane content of six selected Utah coal seamsmore » and the Colorado coal seam was measured in situ using a special sample collection device and a bubble desorbometer. Coal samples were collected at each measurement site for laboratory analysis. The cleat and joint system was evaluated for the coal and surrounding rocks and geological conditions were noted. Permeability measurements were performed on selected samples and all samples were analyzed for proximate and ultimate analysis, petrographic analysis, {sup 13}C NMR dipolar-dephasing spectroscopy, and density analysis. The observed methane adsorption behavior was correlated with the chemical structure and physical properties of the coals.« less

Progress in donor assisted coal liquefaction: Hydroaromatic compound formation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Kottenstette, R.J.; Stephens, H.P.

1993-12-31

The role of hydrogen donor compounds in coal liquefaction has been extensively investigated since the mid 1960`s using model compounds and process derived hydrogen donor solvents. Our recent research and that of other investigators have shown that two model compounds in particular have great efficacy in solvating low rank coals. 1,2,3,10b tetrahydrofluoranthene (H{sub 4}Fl) and 1,2,3,6,7,8 hexahydropyrene (H{sub 6}Py) have been used to dissolve Wyodak coal to > 95% soluble material as measured by tetrahydrofuran (THF). Although these hydrogen donors are very effective, they may not be found in any significant concentrations in actual liquefaction process recycle solvents. Therefore, studiesmore » with process derived recycle materials are necessary to understand donor solvent chemistry. The objective of this paper is to present results of solvent hydrogenation experiments using heavy distillate solvents produced during testing at the Wilsonville Advanced Coal Liquefaction Test Facility. We evaluated the impact of hydrogenation conditions upon hydrogen donor formation in process derived distillates and compared these process derived solvents with the highly effective H{sub 4}Fl and H{sub 6}Py donors in coal liquefaction tests. This paper presents data on reaction conditions used for distillate hydrotreating and subsequent coal liquefaction, with an aim toward understanding the relationship between reaction conditions and donor solvent quality in recycle distillates.« less

Studies of coupled chemical and catalytic coal conversion methods

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Stock, L.M.

1988-01-01

Liquefaction of coal by depolymerization in an organic solvent has been studied for several years. The liquefied coal extract which results from such a process is far more suitable for conversion into liquid fuel by hydrogenolysis than is the untreated coal. Investigations on the chemical structure and the reactive sites of coal can help to select useful reactions for the production of liquids from coal. Sternberg et al. demonstrated that the reductive alkylation method transforms bituminous coal into an enormously soluble substance, irrespective of the mild reaction conditions. The effectiveness of newly introduced alkyl groups for the disruption of intermolecularmore » hydrogen bonds and pi-pi interactions between the aromatic sheets in coal macromolecules has been recognized. It has been reported by Ignasiak et al. that a C-alkylabon reaction using sodium or potassium amide in liquid ammonia can be used to introduce alkyl groups at acidic carbon sites. A method has been developed recently in this laboratory for the solubilization of high rank coals. In the previous reports it was shown that n-butyl lithium and potassium t-butoxide in refluxing heptane produced coal anions which could be alkylated with different alkyl halides. Such alkylated coals were soluble up to 92% in solvents like pyridine. Though the solubilization of coal depended very much on the length of the alkyl group, it also depended very much on the nature of the base used. Strong bases like n-butyl lithium (pKa=42) can cause proton abstraction from aromatic structures, if the more acidic benzylic protons are absent. The utility of this procedure, initially developed and used by Miyake and Stock, has now been tested with the high oxygen containing, low rank Illinois No. 6 and Wyodak coals.« less

Integrated coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Effron, Edward

1978-01-01

In a process for the liquefaction of coal in which coal liquids containing phenols and other oxygenated compounds are produced during the liquefaction step and later hydrogenated, oxygenated compounds are removed from at least part of the coal liquids in the naphtha and gas oil boiling range prior to the hydrogenation step and employed as a feed stream for the manufacture of a synthesis gas or for other purposes.

Process for hydrogenating coal and coal solvents

DOEpatents

Tarrer, Arthur R.; Shridharani, Ketan G.

1983-01-01

A novel process is described for the hydrogenation of coal by the hydrogenation of a solvent for the coal in which the hydrogenation of the coal solvent is conducted in the presence of a solvent hydrogenation catalyst of increased activity, wherein the hydrogenation catalyst is produced by reacting ferric oxide with hydrogen sulfide at a temperature range of 260.degree. C. to 315.degree. C. in an inert atmosphere to produce an iron sulfide hydrogenation catalyst for the solvent. Optimally, the reaction temperature is 275.degree. C. Alternately, the reaction can be conducted in a hydrogen atmosphere at 350.degree. C.

Process for changing caking coals to noncaking coals

DOEpatents

Beeson, Justin L.

1980-01-01

Caking coals are treated in a slurry including alkaline earth metal hydroxides at moderate pressures and temperatures in air to form noncaking carbonaceous material. Hydroxides such as calcium hydroxide, magnesium hydroxide or barium hydroxide are contemplated for slurrying with the coal to interact with the agglomerating constituents. The slurry is subsequently dewatered and dried in air at atmospheric pressure to produce a nonagglomerating carbonaceous material that can be conveniently handled in various coal conversion and combustion processes.

Constrained Low-Rank Learning Using Least Squares-Based Regularization.

PubMed

Li, Ping; Yu, Jun; Wang, Meng; Zhang, Luming; Cai, Deng; Li, Xuelong

2017-12-01

Low-rank learning has attracted much attention recently due to its efficacy in a rich variety of real-world tasks, e.g., subspace segmentation and image categorization. Most low-rank methods are incapable of capturing low-dimensional subspace for supervised learning tasks, e.g., classification and regression. This paper aims to learn both the discriminant low-rank representation (LRR) and the robust projecting subspace in a supervised manner. To achieve this goal, we cast the problem into a constrained rank minimization framework by adopting the least squares regularization. Naturally, the data label structure tends to resemble that of the corresponding low-dimensional representation, which is derived from the robust subspace projection of clean data by low-rank learning. Moreover, the low-dimensional representation of original data can be paired with some informative structure by imposing an appropriate constraint, e.g., Laplacian regularizer. Therefore, we propose a novel constrained LRR method. The objective function is formulated as a constrained nuclear norm minimization problem, which can be solved by the inexact augmented Lagrange multiplier algorithm. Extensive experiments on image classification, human pose estimation, and robust face recovery have confirmed the superiority of our method.

Recent regulatory experience of low-Btu coal gasification. Volume III. Supporting case studies

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ackerman, E.; Hart, D.; Lethi, M.

The MITRE Corporation conducted a five-month study for the Office of Resource Applications in the Department of Energy on the regulatory requirements of low-Btu coal gasification. During this study, MITRE interviewed representatives of five current low-Btu coal gasification projects and regulatory agencies in five states. From these interviews, MITRE has sought the experience of current low-Btu coal gasification users in order to recommend actions to improve the regulatory process. This report is the third of three volumes. It contains the results of interviews conducted for each of the case studies. Volume 1 of the report contains the analysis of themore » case studies and recommendations to potential industrial users of low-Btu coal gasification. Volume 2 contains recommendations to regulatory agencies.« less

Investigation of coal properties and airborne respirable dust generation. Report of investigations/1998

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Organiscak, J.A.; Page, S.J.

1998-10-01

Laboratory crushing experiments were conducted on a range of low- to high-volatile bituminous coals to investigate the various factors influencing airborne respirable dust (ARD) generation. This research was conducted to identify the principles of ARD liberation from the coal product. Five U.S. bituminous coals were uniformly prepared and processed through a double roll crusher located in a low-velocity wind tunnel. Experimental factors studied included inherent coal seam constituents, coal grindability, specific energy of crushing, product size characteristics, dust cloud electrostatic field, and specific ARD generated. The results of this investigation indicate that a combination of several factors are associated withmore » ARD generation. One factor is the effect of coal rank, described by the inherent moist fuel ratio, on the product size characteristics, defined by Schuhmann size function parameters. Another key factor is the effect of air dry loss (ADL) moisture in the coal seam on the breakage-induced electrostatic field of airborne dust. The effect of these factors is that different percentages of <10-micrometers coal particles are dispersed as ARD. A discussion of electrostatic field principles, coal ADL, and its effect on ARD generation is presented.« less

Quarterly technical progress report, April-June 1982

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

None

1984-04-01

Progress reports are presented for the following tasks: (1) preparation of low-rank coals; application of liquefaction processes to low-rank coals; (2) slagging fixed-bed gasification; (3) atmospheric fluidized-bed combustion of low-rank coal; (4) ash fouling and combustion modification for low-rank coal; (5) combined flue gas cleanup/simultaneous SO/sub x/-NO/sub x/ control; (6) particulate control and hydrocarbons and trace element emissions from low-rank coals; (7) waste characterization and disposal; and (9) exploratory research.

Probabilistic Low-Rank Multitask Learning.

PubMed

Kong, Yu; Shao, Ming; Li, Kang; Fu, Yun

2018-03-01

In this paper, we consider the problem of learning multiple related tasks simultaneously with the goal of improving the generalization performance of individual tasks. The key challenge is to effectively exploit the shared information across multiple tasks as well as preserve the discriminative information for each individual task. To address this, we propose a novel probabilistic model for multitask learning (MTL) that can automatically balance between low-rank and sparsity constraints. The former assumes a low-rank structure of the underlying predictive hypothesis space to explicitly capture the relationship of different tasks and the latter learns the incoherent sparse patterns private to each task. We derive and perform inference via variational Bayesian methods. Experimental results on both regression and classification tasks on real-world applications demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in dealing with the MTL problems.

Recent progress in cell-free solubilization of coal

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cohen, M.S.; Aronson, H.; Feldman, K.

1988-01-01

Low rank coal has been solubilized using cell-free filtrates separated from cultures of Polyporus versicolor. Solubilization has been obtained with neat filtrates and with fractions collected from the neat filtrates after gel permeation chromatography. The coal solubilizing enzymes have been collected in enriched fractions with gpc. This increased relative purity has allowed the determination of the average molecular weight of this enzyme by gel permeation chromatography and by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. Rates of coal solubilization are dependent on the size of coal particles, mass of coal, temperature, pH, concentration of the cell-free filtrate, and the concentration of several inorganic ions.

Fungal degradation of coal as a pretreatment for methane production

USGS Publications Warehouse

Haider, Rizwan; Ghauri, Muhammad A.; SanFilipo, John R.; Jones, Elizabeth J.; Orem, William H.; Tatu, Calin A.; Akhtar, Kalsoom; Akhtar, Nasrin

2013-01-01

Coal conversion technologies can help in taking advantage of huge low rank coal reserves by converting those into alternative fuels like methane. In this regard, fungal degradation of coal can serve as a pretreatment step in order to make coal a suitable substrate for biological beneficiation. A fungal isolate MW1, identified as Penicillium chrysogenum on the basis of fungal ITS sequences, was isolated from a core sample of coal, taken from a well drilled by the US. Geological Survey in Montana, USA. The low rank coal samples, from major coal fields of Pakistan, were treated with MW1 for 7 days in the presence of 0.1% ammonium sulfate as nitrogen source and 0.1% glucose as a supplemental carbon source. Liquid extracts were analyzed through Excitation–Emission Matrix Spectroscopy (EEMS) to obtain qualitative estimates of solubilized coal; these analyses indicated the release of complex organic functionalities. In addition, GC–MS analysis of these extracts confirmed the presence of single ring aromatics, polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), aromatic nitrogen compounds and aliphatics. Subsequently, the released organics were subjected to a bioassay for the generation of methane which conferred the potential application of fungal degradation as pretreatment. Additionally, fungal-mediated degradation was also prospected for extracting some other chemical entities like humic acids from brown coals with high huminite content especially from Thar, the largest lignite reserve of Pakistan.

Low-rank matrix decomposition and spatio-temporal sparse recovery for STAP radar

DOE PAGES

Sen, Satyabrata

2015-08-04

We develop space-time adaptive processing (STAP) methods by leveraging the advantages of sparse signal processing techniques in order to detect a slowly-moving target. We observe that the inherent sparse characteristics of a STAP problem can be formulated as the low-rankness of clutter covariance matrix when compared to the total adaptive degrees-of-freedom, and also as the sparse interference spectrum on the spatio-temporal domain. By exploiting these sparse properties, we propose two approaches for estimating the interference covariance matrix. In the first approach, we consider a constrained matrix rank minimization problem (RMP) to decompose the sample covariance matrix into a low-rank positivemore » semidefinite and a diagonal matrix. The solution of RMP is obtained by applying the trace minimization technique and the singular value decomposition with matrix shrinkage operator. Our second approach deals with the atomic norm minimization problem to recover the clutter response-vector that has a sparse support on the spatio-temporal plane. We use convex relaxation based standard sparse-recovery techniques to find the solutions. With extensive numerical examples, we demonstrate the performances of proposed STAP approaches with respect to both the ideal and practical scenarios, involving Doppler-ambiguous clutter ridges, spatial and temporal decorrelation effects. As a result, the low-rank matrix decomposition based solution requires secondary measurements as many as twice the clutter rank to attain a near-ideal STAP performance; whereas the spatio-temporal sparsity based approach needs a considerably small number of secondary data.« less

Learning Robust and Discriminative Subspace With Low-Rank Constraints.

PubMed

Li, Sheng; Fu, Yun

2016-11-01

In this paper, we aim at learning robust and discriminative subspaces from noisy data. Subspace learning is widely used in extracting discriminative features for classification. However, when data are contaminated with severe noise, the performance of most existing subspace learning methods would be limited. Recent advances in low-rank modeling provide effective solutions for removing noise or outliers contained in sample sets, which motivates us to take advantage of low-rank constraints in order to exploit robust and discriminative subspace for classification. In particular, we present a discriminative subspace learning method called the supervised regularization-based robust subspace (SRRS) approach, by incorporating the low-rank constraint. SRRS seeks low-rank representations from the noisy data, and learns a discriminative subspace from the recovered clean data jointly. A supervised regularization function is designed to make use of the class label information, and therefore to enhance the discriminability of subspace. Our approach is formulated as a constrained rank-minimization problem. We design an inexact augmented Lagrange multiplier optimization algorithm to solve it. Unlike the existing sparse representation and low-rank learning methods, our approach learns a low-dimensional subspace from recovered data, and explicitly incorporates the supervised information. Our approach and some baselines are evaluated on the COIL-100, ALOI, Extended YaleB, FERET, AR, and KinFace databases. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach, especially when the data contain considerable noise or variations.

Continuous-variable quantum Gaussian process regression and quantum singular value decomposition of nonsparse low-rank matrices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Das, Siddhartha; Siopsis, George; Weedbrook, Christian

2018-02-01

With the significant advancement in quantum computation during the past couple of decades, the exploration of machine-learning subroutines using quantum strategies has become increasingly popular. Gaussian process regression is a widely used technique in supervised classical machine learning. Here we introduce an algorithm for Gaussian process regression using continuous-variable quantum systems that can be realized with technology based on photonic quantum computers under certain assumptions regarding distribution of data and availability of efficient quantum access. Our algorithm shows that by using a continuous-variable quantum computer a dramatic speedup in computing Gaussian process regression can be achieved, i.e., the possibility of exponentially reducing the time to compute. Furthermore, our results also include a continuous-variable quantum-assisted singular value decomposition method of nonsparse low rank matrices and forms an important subroutine in our Gaussian process regression algorithm.

Catalytic two-stage coal liquefaction process having improved nitrogen removal

DOEpatents

Comolli, Alfred G.

1991-01-01

A process for catalytic multi-stage hydrogenation and liquefaction of coal to produce high yields of low-boiling hydrocarbon liquids containing low concentrations of nitogen compounds. First stage catalytic reaction conditions are 700.degree.-800.degree. F. temperature, 1500-3500 psig hydrogen partial pressure, with the space velocity maintained in a critical range of 10-40 lb coal/hr ft.sup.3 catalyst settled volume. The first stage catalyst has 0.3-1.2 cc/gm total pore volume with at least 25% of the pore volume in pores having diameters of 200-2000 Angstroms. Second stage reaction conditions are 760.degree.-870.degree. F. temperature with space velocity exceeding that in the first stage reactor, so as to achieve increased hydrogenation yield of low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid products having at least 75% removal of nitrogen compounds from the coal-derived liquid products.

Weighted Discriminative Dictionary Learning based on Low-rank Representation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chang, Heyou; Zheng, Hao

2017-01-01

Low-rank representation has been widely used in the field of pattern classification, especially when both training and testing images are corrupted with large noise. Dictionary plays an important role in low-rank representation. With respect to the semantic dictionary, the optimal representation matrix should be block-diagonal. However, traditional low-rank representation based dictionary learning methods cannot effectively exploit the discriminative information between data and dictionary. To address this problem, this paper proposed weighted discriminative dictionary learning based on low-rank representation, where a weighted representation regularization term is constructed. The regularization associates label information of both training samples and dictionary atoms, and encourages to generate a discriminative representation with class-wise block-diagonal structure, which can further improve the classification performance where both training and testing images are corrupted with large noise. Experimental results demonstrate advantages of the proposed method over the state-of-the-art methods.

Quality of economically extractable coal beds in the Gillette coal field as compared with other Tertiary coal beds in the Powder River basin, Wyoming and Montana

USGS Publications Warehouse

Ellis, Margaret S.

2002-01-01

The Powder River Basin, and specifically the Gillette coal field, contains large quantities of economically extractable coal resources. These coal resources have low total sulfur content and ash yield, and most of the resources are subbituminous in rank. A recent U.S Geological Survey study of economically extractable coal in the Gillette coal field focused on five coal beds, the Wyodak rider, Upper Wyodak, Canyon, Lower Wyodak-Werner, and Gates/Kennedy. This report compares the coal quality of these economically extractable coal beds to coal in the Wyodak-Anderson coal zone in the Powder River Basin and in the Gillette coal field (Flores and others, 1999) and other produced coal in the Gillette coal field (Glass, 2000). The Upper Wyodak, Canyon, and Lower Wyodak/Werner beds are within the Wyodak-Anderson coal zone. Compared with all coal in the Wyodak-Anderson coal zone, both throughout the Powder River Basin and just within the Gillette coal field; the thick, persistent Upper Wyodak coal bed in the Gillette coal field has higher mean gross calorific value (8,569 Btu/lb), lower mean ash yield (5.8 percent), and lower mean total sulfur content (0.46 percent).

Coal Formation and Geochemistry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Orem, W. H.; Finkelman, R. B.

2003-12-01

technological behavior, by-product characteristics, and environmental and human health impacts. In this chapter, we will try to make geochemical sense of this wonderfully complex and important resource. (5K)Figure 1. Photograph of a low rank coal bed (lignite of Pliocene age) from southwestern Romania.

Reactivity of coal in direct hydrogenation processes: Technical progress report, March-May 1987

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Baldwin, R.M.; Miller, R.L.

Research during the past quarter centered on continuation of two facets related to the study of coal reactivity in direct hydrogenation liquefaction processes. Five coals from the Argonne Premium coal collection were liquefied at three temperature levels in order to gather data for kinetic analysis purposes. Conversion of these coals to THF-, toluene-, and hexane-solubles was determined at temperatures of 425, 400, and 375 C, and nominal reaction times of 3, 5, 10, 15, and 40 minutes in the microautoclave batch reaction system. Preliminary mathematical modeling of the data using simple irreversible rate expressions and more complex formulations based onmore » a statistical distribution of activation energies was initiated in order to investigate the feasibility of utilizing activation energy as an additional reactivity screening factor. Use of complex models such as the Anthony-Howard formulation for purposes of activation energy determination from liquefaction data at one temperature level was further examined. Five of the 21 coals from the Penn State Premium coal sample bank were liquefied at the standard reactivity screening conditions, and the rate and extent of conversion to THF-, and toluene-, and hexane-solubles quantified. These data were added to the existing data base containing similar information for the prior coal suites from the Exxon and Argonne collections, and preliminary correlational efforts for reactivity vs. coal properties were initiated. Prior conclusions regarding the effect of rank on the rate and extent of conversion were qualitatively verified from the data collected. 1 ref., 13 figs., 2 tabs.« less

Current status and prospect: Coal water mixture technology in Indonesia

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sastrawinata, T.; Suwono, A.

1996-12-31

This paper covers the status of Coal Water Mixture (CWM) technology in Indonesia and also the prospect for implementing this technology. Advantageous use of a pipeline for coal transportation is geographically inconvenient. Characteristics of CWM for Indonesian coal and combustion characteristics of CWM for Indonesian coal are reviewed. The coal reserve estimated in Indonesia is about 36 billions tons with ratio of lignite and higher rank is 60:40. The main problems faced in the coal utilization in Indonesia is the transportation from the mines to the users. Remote, limited infrastructure and the geographic conditions are factors which contribute to themore » problems. The CWM made of Indonesian low rank coal from various origins has been prepared for further study. The CWM of various coal concentration up to 66% with good handling and storage stability was obtained. Rheological measurements of the obtained CWM shows that for high coal concentration (greater than about 40%), in addition to the yield stress, the solution also behaves as the power law model of fluid. Energy Technology Laboratory has just started to investigate the combustion characteristics of CWM. CWM in Indonesia has not been utilized commercially in the industrial boiler, so that needs to be studied comprehensively. The technical aspects in this is stressed on the combustion characteristics in the boiler furnace. LSDE has a state of the art coal combustion facility that includes a chemical analytic laboratory and a boiler simulator equipped with complete data acquisition. The experiments will have several numerical criteria to characterize CWS combustion process, i.e., Maximum Furnace Exit Temperature, firing rate, pressure drop in the test section, deposit strength and deposit weight, swirl flow number.« less

Coal desulfurization by low temperature chlorinolysis, phase 3

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kalvinskas, J. J.; Rohatgi, N. K.; Ernest, J.

1981-01-01

Laboratory scale, bench scale batch reactor, and minipilot plant tests were conducted on 22 bituminous, subbituminous, and lignite coals. Chemical pretreatment and post treatment of coals relative to the chlorination were tried as a means of enhancing desulfurization by the chlorinolysis process. Elevated temperature (500-700 C) hydrogen treatment of chlorinolysis-processed coal at atmospheric pressure was found to substantially increase coal desulfurization up to 90 percent. Sulfur forms, proximate and ultimate analyses of the processed coal are included. Minipilot plant operation indicates that the continuous flow reactor provides coal desulfurization results comparable to those obtained in the batch reactor. Seven runs were conducted at coal feed rates of 1.5 to 8.8 kg per hour using water and methylchloroform solvents, gaseous chlorine feed of 3 to 31.4 SCFH at 21 to 70 C, and atmospheric pressure for retention times of 20 to 120 minutes.

Free radical reaction characteristics of coal low-temperature oxidation and its inhibition method.

PubMed

Li, Zenghua; Kong, Biao; Wei, Aizhu; Yang, Yongliang; Zhou, Yinbo; Zhang, Lanzhun

2016-12-01

Study on the mechanism of coal spontaneous combustion is significant for controlling fire disasters due to coal spontaneous combustion. The free radical reactions can explain the chemical process of coal at low-temperature oxidation. Electron spin resonance (ESR) spectroscopy was used to measure the change rules of the different sorts and different granularity of coal directly; ESR spectroscopy chart of free radicals following the changes of temperatures was compared by the coal samples applying air and blowing nitrogen, original coal samples, dry coal samples, and demineralized coal samples. The fragmentation process was the key factor of producing and initiating free radical reactions. Oxygen, moisture, and mineral accelerated the free radical reactions. Combination of the free radical reaction mechanism, the mechanical fragmentation leaded to the elevated CO concentration, fracturing of coal pillar was more prone to spontaneous combustion, and spontaneous combustion in goaf accounted for a large proportion of the fire in the mine were explained. The method of added diphenylamine can inhibit the self-oxidation of coal effectively, the action mechanism of diphenylamine was analyzed by free radical chain reaction, and this research can offer new method for the development of new flame retardant.

Trace element geochemistry and mineralogy of coal from Samaleswari open cast coal block (S-OCB), Eastern India

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Saha, Debasree; Chatterjee, Debashis; Chakravarty, Sanchita; Mazumder, Madhurina

2018-04-01

Coal samples of Samaleswari open cast coal block (S-OCB) are high ash (Aad, mean value 35.43%) and low sulphur content (St, on dry basis, mean value 0.91% < 1%) in quality. The stratigraphic variation of volatile matter and fixed carbon (dry ash-free) reflect a progress of coal metamorphism with depth that accordance to the coal rank variation from lignite to high volatile bituminous in the studied borehole. The younger coal seams have greater detrital minerals (quartz, illite, rutile) influence whereas older coal seams have greater authigenic mineral (kaolinite, dolomite, siderite, apatite) contribution that are possibly due to subsidence and sediment transportation. In S-OCB coal trace elements affinities in-between mineral and organic fraction are identified with statistical hierarchical cluster analysis. The work is further supported by the use of chemical fractionation experiment that reveals the multi mode of occurrence of several environmentally concern and interested trace elements (Sb, As, Be, Cd, Cr, Co, Cu, Pb, Mn, Ni, Zn). Among the analysed trace elements Co, Mn and Zn have major silicate association along with significant carbonate/oxide/monosulfide association. Whereas As, Cd, Cu, Pb and Ni have dominant pyritic association with notable silicate and carbonate/oxide/monosulfide association. The rest three elements (Sb, Be, Cr) have principally organic association with minor silicate and carbonate/oxide/monosulfide association. The stratigraphic variation of organo-mineral matrix content and detrital-authigenic mineral ratio are primarily related to coal rank. Geochemical character of coal also reflects a light towards proper utilisation of S-OCB coal from technical and environmental view point.

Activities of the Institute of Chemical Processing of Coal at Zabrze

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dreszer, K.

1995-12-31

The Institute of Chemical Processing of Coal at Zabrze was established in 1955. The works on carbochemical technologies have been, therefore, carried out at the Institute for 40 years. The targets of the Institute`s activities are research, scientific and developing works regarding a sensible utilization of fuels via their processing into more refined forms, safe environment, highly efficient use of energy carriers and technological products of special quality. The Institute of Chemical Processing of Coal has been dealing with the following: optimized use of home hard coals; improvement of classic coal coking technologies, processing and utilization of volatile coking products;more » production technologies of low emission rate fuels for communal management; analyses of coal processing technologies; new technologies aimed at increasing the efficiency of coal utilization for energy-generating purposes, especially in industry and studies on the ecological aspects of these processes; production technologies of sorbents and carbon activating agents and technologies of the utilization; rationalization of water and wastes management in the metallurgical and chemical industries in connection with removal of pollution especially dangerous to the environment from wastes; utilization technologies of refined materials (electrode cokes, binders, impregnating agents) for making electrodes, refractories and new generation construction carbon materials; production technologies of high quality bituminous and bituminous and resin coating, anti-corrosive and insulation materials; environmentally friendly utilization technologies for power station, mine and other wastes, and dedusting processes in industrial gas streams.« less

Brecciated and mineralized coals in Union County Western Kentucky coal field

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hower, J.C.; Williams, D.A.; Eble, C.F.; Sakulpitakphon, T.; Moecher, D.P.

2001-01-01

Coals from the D-2 and D-3 boreholes in the Grove Center 7 1/2 min quadrangle, Union County, KY, have been found to be highly brecciated and mineralized. The mineralization is dominated by a carbonate assemblage with minor sulfides and sulfates. Included among the secondary minerals is the lead selenide, clausthalite. Overall, the emplacement of secondary vein minerals was responsible for raising the rank of the coals from the 0.6-0.7% Rmax range found in the area to as high as 0.95-0.99% Rmax. A 1.3-m-thick coal found in one of the boreholes is unique among known Western Kentucky coals in having less than 50% vitrinite. Semifusinite and fusinite dominate the maceral assemblages. The coal is also low in sulfur coal, which is unusual for the Illinois Basin. It has an ash yield of less than 10%; much of it dominated by pervasive carbonate veining. The age of the thick coal in core D-2 is similar to that of the Elm Lick coal bed, found elsewhere in the Western Kentucky coalfield. The coals in D-3 are younger, having Stephanian palynomorph assemblages. ?? 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

A Kernel-Based Low-Rank (KLR) Model for Low-Dimensional Manifold Recovery in Highly Accelerated Dynamic MRI.

PubMed

Nakarmi, Ukash; Wang, Yanhua; Lyu, Jingyuan; Liang, Dong; Ying, Leslie

2017-11-01

While many low rank and sparsity-based approaches have been developed for accelerated dynamic magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI), they all use low rankness or sparsity in input space, overlooking the intrinsic nonlinear correlation in most dMRI data. In this paper, we propose a kernel-based framework to allow nonlinear manifold models in reconstruction from sub-Nyquist data. Within this framework, many existing algorithms can be extended to kernel framework with nonlinear models. In particular, we have developed a novel algorithm with a kernel-based low-rank model generalizing the conventional low rank formulation. The algorithm consists of manifold learning using kernel, low rank enforcement in feature space, and preimaging with data consistency. Extensive simulation and experiment results show that the proposed method surpasses the conventional low-rank-modeled approaches for dMRI.

Dynamics of Ranking Processes in Complex Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Blumm, Nicholas; Ghoshal, Gourab; Forró, Zalán; Schich, Maximilian; Bianconi, Ginestra; Bouchaud, Jean-Philippe; Barabási, Albert-László

2012-09-01

The world is addicted to ranking: everything, from the reputation of scientists, journals, and universities to purchasing decisions is driven by measured or perceived differences between them. Here, we analyze empirical data capturing real time ranking in a number of systems, helping to identify the universal characteristics of ranking dynamics. We develop a continuum theory that not only predicts the stability of the ranking process, but shows that a noise-induced phase transition is at the heart of the observed differences in ranking regimes. The key parameters of the continuum theory can be explicitly measured from data, allowing us to predict and experimentally document the existence of three phases that govern ranking stability.

Fungal colonization and enzyme-mediated metabolism of waste coal by Neosartorya fischeri strain ECCN 84.

PubMed

Sekhohola, Lerato Mary; Isaacs, Michelle Louise; Cowan, Ashton Keith

2014-01-01

Colonization and oxidative metabolism of South African low-rank discard coal by the fungal strain ECCN 84 previously isolated from a coal environment and identified as Neosartorya fischeri was investigated. Results show that waste coal supported fungal growth. Colonization of waste coal particles by N. fischeri ECCN 84 was associated with the formation of compact spherical pellets or sclerotia-like structures. Dissection of the pellets from liquid cultures revealed a nucleus of "engulfed" coal which when analyzed by energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy showed a time-dependent decline in weight percentage of elemental carbon and an increase in elemental oxygen. Proliferation of peroxisomes in hyphae attached to coal particles and increased extracellular laccase activity occurred after addition of waste coal to cultures of N. fischeri ECCN 84. These results support a role for oxidative enzyme action in the biodegradation of coal and suggest that extracellular laccase is a key component in this process.

Assessment of advanced coal gasification processes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mccarthy, J.; Ferrall, J.; Charng, T.; Houseman, J.

1981-01-01

A technical assessment of the following advanced coal gasification processes is presented: high throughput gasification (HTG) process; single stage high mass flux (HMF) processes; (CS/R) hydrogasification process; and the catalytic coal gasification (CCG) process. Each process is evaluated for its potential to produce synthetic natural gas from a bituminous coal. Key similarities, differences, strengths, weaknesses, and potential improvements to each process are identified. The HTG and the HMF gasifiers share similarities with respect to: short residence time (SRT), high throughput rate, slagging, and syngas as the initial raw product gas. The CS/R hydrogasifier is also SRT, but is nonslagging and produces a raw gas high in methane content. The CCG gasifier is a long residence time, catalytic, fluidbed reactor producing all of the raw product methane in the gasifier.

Low-rank regularization for learning gene expression programs.

PubMed

Ye, Guibo; Tang, Mengfan; Cai, Jian-Feng; Nie, Qing; Xie, Xiaohui

2013-01-01

Learning gene expression programs directly from a set of observations is challenging due to the complexity of gene regulation, high noise of experimental measurements, and insufficient number of experimental measurements. Imposing additional constraints with strong and biologically motivated regularizations is critical in developing reliable and effective algorithms for inferring gene expression programs. Here we propose a new form of regulation that constrains the number of independent connectivity patterns between regulators and targets, motivated by the modular design of gene regulatory programs and the belief that the total number of independent regulatory modules should be small. We formulate a multi-target linear regression framework to incorporate this type of regulation, in which the number of independent connectivity patterns is expressed as the rank of the connectivity matrix between regulators and targets. We then generalize the linear framework to nonlinear cases, and prove that the generalized low-rank regularization model is still convex. Efficient algorithms are derived to solve both the linear and nonlinear low-rank regularized problems. Finally, we test the algorithms on three gene expression datasets, and show that the low-rank regularization improves the accuracy of gene expression prediction in these three datasets.

Role of oxygen functional groups for structure and dynamics of interfacial water on low rank coal surface: a molecular dynamics simulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

You, Xiaofang; Wei, Hengbin; Zhu, Xianchang; Lyu, Xianjun; Li, Lin

2018-07-01

Molecular dynamics simulations were employed to study the effects of oxygen functional groups for structure and dynamics properties of interfacial water molecules on the subbituminous coal surface. Because of complex composition and structure, the graphite surface modified by hydroxyl, carboxyl and carbonyl groups was used to represent the surface model of subbituminous coal according to XPS results, and the composing proportion for hydroxyl, carbonyl and carboxyl is 25:3:5. The hydration energy with -386.28 kJ/mol means that the adsorption process between water and coal surface is spontaneous. Density profiles for oxygen atoms and hydrogen atoms indicate that the coal surface properties affect the structural and dynamic characteristics of the interfacial water molecules. The interfacial water exhibits much more ordering than bulk water. The results of radial distribution functions, mean square displacement and local self-diffusion coefficient for water molecule related to three oxygen moieties confirmed that the water molecules prefer to absorb with carboxylic groups, and adsorption of water molecules at the hydroxyl and carbonyl is similar.

Face the hierarchy: ERP and oscillatory brain responses in social rank processing.

PubMed

Breton, Audrey; Jerbi, Karim; Henaff, Marie-Anne; Cheylus, Anne; Baudouin, Jean-Yves; Schmitz, Christina; Krolak-Salmon, Pierre; Van der Henst, Jean-Baptiste

2014-01-01

Recognition of social hierarchy is a key feature that helps us navigate through our complex social environment. Neuroimaging studies have identified brain structures involved in the processing of hierarchical stimuli but the precise temporal dynamics of brain activity associated with such processing remains largely unknown. Here, we used electroencephalography to examine the effect of social hierarchy on neural responses elicited by faces. In contrast to previous studies, the key manipulation was that a hierarchical context was constructed, not by varying facial expressions, but by presenting neutral-expression faces in a game setting. Once the performance-based hierarchy was established, participants were presented with high-rank, middle-rank and low-rank player faces and had to evaluate the rank of each face with respect to their own position. Both event-related potentials and task-related oscillatory activity were investigated. Three main findings emerge from the study. First, the experimental manipulation had no effect on the early N170 component, which may suggest that hierarchy did not modulate the structural encoding of neutral-expression faces. Second, hierarchy significantly modulated the amplitude of the late positive potential (LPP) within a 400-700 ms time-window, with more a prominent LPP occurring when the participants processed the face of the highest-rank player. Third, high-rank faces were associated with the highest reduction of alpha power. Taken together these findings provide novel electrophysiological evidence for enhanced allocation of attentional resource in the presence of high-rank faces. At a broader level, this study brings new insights into the neural processing underlying social categorization.

Max-margin multiattribute learning with low-rank constraint.

PubMed

Zhang, Qiang; Chen, Lin; Li, Baoxin

2014-07-01

Attribute learning has attracted a lot of interests in recent years for its advantage of being able to model high-level concepts with a compact set of midlevel attributes. Real-world objects often demand multiple attributes for effective modeling. Most existing methods learn attributes independently without explicitly considering their intrinsic relatedness. In this paper, we propose max margin multiattribute learning with low-rank constraint, which learns a set of attributes simultaneously, using only relative ranking of the attributes for the data. By learning all the attributes simultaneously through low-rank constraint, the proposed method is able to capture their intrinsic correlation for improved learning; by requiring only relative ranking, the method avoids restrictive binary labels of attributes that are often assumed by many existing techniques. The proposed method is evaluated on both synthetic data and real visual data including a challenging video data set. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Method for processing coal-enrichment waste with solid and volatile fuel inclusions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Khasanova, A. V.; Zhirgalova, T. B.; Osintsev, K. V.

2017-10-01

The method relates to the field of industrial heat and power engineering. It can be used in coal preparation plants for processing coal waste. This new way is realized to produce a loose ash residue directed to the production of silicate products and fuel gas in rotary kilns. The proposed method is associated with industrial processing of brown coal beneficiation waste. Waste is obtained by flotation separation of rock particles up to 13 mm in size from coal particles. They have in their composition both solid and volatile fuel inclusions (components). Due to the high humidity and significant rock content, low heat of combustion, these wastes are not used on energy boilers, they are stored in dumps polluting the environment.

Plasma Torch for Plasma Ignition and Combustion of Coal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ustimenko, Alexandr; Messerle, Vladimir

2015-09-01

Plasma-fuel systems (PFS) have been developed to improve coal combustion efficiency. PFS is a pulverized coal burner equipped with arc plasma torch producing high temperature air stream of 4000 - 6000 K. Plasma activation of coal at the PFS increases the coal reactivity and provides more effective ignition and ecologically friendly incineration of low-rank coal. The main and crucial element of PFS is plasma torch. Simplicity and reliability of the industrial arc plasma torches using cylindrical copper cathode and air as plasma forming gas predestined their application at heat and power engineering for plasma aided coal combustion. Life time of these plasma torches electrodes is critical and usually limited to 200 hours. Considered in this report direct current arc plasma torch has the cathode life significantly exceeded 1000 hours. To ensure the electrodes long life the process of hydrocarbon gas dissociation in the electric arc discharge is used. In accordance to this method atoms and ions of carbon from near-electrode plasma deposit on the active surface of the electrodes and form electrode carbon condensate which operates as ``actual'' electrode. Complex physicochemical investigation showed that deposit consists of nanocarbon material.

Catalytic two-stage coal hydrogenation process using extinction recycle of heavy liquid fraction

DOEpatents

MacArthur, J.B.; Comolli, A.G.; McLean, J.B.

1989-10-17

A process is described for catalytic two-stage hydrogenation and liquefaction of coal with selective extinction recycle of all heavy liquid fractions boiling above a distillation cut point of about 600--750 F to produce increased yields of low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid and gas products. In the process, the particulate coal feed is slurried with a process-derived liquid solvent normally boiling above about 650 F and fed into a first stage catalytic reaction zone operated at conditions which promote controlled rate liquefaction of the coal, while simultaneously hydrogenating the hydrocarbon recycle oils. The first stage reactor is maintained at 710--800 F temperature, 1,000--4,000 psig hydrogen partial pressure, and 10-90 lb/hr per ft[sup 3] catalyst space velocity. Partially hydrogenated material withdrawn from the first stage reaction zone is passed directly to the second stage catalytic reaction zone maintained at 760--860 F temperature for further hydrogenation and hydroconversion reactions. A 600--750 F[sup +] fraction containing 0--20 W % unreacted coal and ash solids is recycled to the coal slurrying step. If desired, the cut point lower boiling fraction can be further catalytically hydrotreated. By this process, the coal feed is successively catalytically hydrogenated and hydroconverted at selected conditions, to provide significantly increased yields of desirable low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid products and minimal production of hydrocarbon gases, and no net production of undesirable heavy oils and residuum materials. 2 figs.

Catalytic two-stage coal hydrogenation process using extinction recycle of heavy liquid fraction

DOEpatents

MacArthur, James B.; Comolli, Alfred G.; McLean, Joseph B.

1989-01-01

A process for catalytic two-stage hydrogenation and liquefaction of coal with selective extinction recycle of all heavy liquid fractions boiling above a distillation cut point of about 600.degree.-750.degree. F. to produce increased yields of low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid and gas products. In the process, the particulate coal feed is slurried with a process-derived liquid solvent normally boiling above about 650.degree. F. and fed into a first stage catalytic reaction zone operated at conditions which promote controlled rate liquefaction of the coal, while simultaneously hydrogenating the hydrocarbon recycle oils. The first stage reactor is maintained at 710.degree.-800.degree. F. temperature, 1000-4000 psig hydrogen partial pressure, and 10-90 lb/hr per ft.sup.3 catalyst space velocity. Partially hydrogenated material withdrawn from the first stage reaction zone is passed directly to the second stage catalytic reaction zone maintained at 760.degree.-860.degree. F. temperature for further hydrogenation and hydroconversion reactions. A 600.degree.-750.degree. F..sup.+ fraction containing 0-20 W % unreacted coal and ash solids is recycled to the coal slurrying step. If desired, the cut point lower boiling fraction can be further catalytically hydrotreated. By this process, the coal feed is successively catalytically hydrogenated and hydroconverted at selected conditions, to provide significantly increased yields of desirable low-boiling hydrocarbon liquid products and minimal production of hydrocarbon gases, and no net production of undesirable heavy oils and residuum materials.

Active subspace: toward scalable low-rank learning.

PubMed

Liu, Guangcan; Yan, Shuicheng

2012-12-01

We address the scalability issues in low-rank matrix learning problems. Usually these problems resort to solving nuclear norm regularized optimization problems (NNROPs), which often suffer from high computational complexities if based on existing solvers, especially in large-scale settings. Based on the fact that the optimal solution matrix to an NNROP is often low rank, we revisit the classic mechanism of low-rank matrix factorization, based on which we present an active subspace algorithm for efficiently solving NNROPs by transforming large-scale NNROPs into small-scale problems. The transformation is achieved by factorizing the large solution matrix into the product of a small orthonormal matrix (active subspace) and another small matrix. Although such a transformation generally leads to nonconvex problems, we show that a suboptimal solution can be found by the augmented Lagrange alternating direction method. For the robust PCA (RPCA) (Candès, Li, Ma, & Wright, 2009 ) problem, a typical example of NNROPs, theoretical results verify the suboptimality of the solution produced by our algorithm. For the general NNROPs, we empirically show that our algorithm significantly reduces the computational complexity without loss of optimality.

Relationships between data from Rock-Eval pyrolysis and proximate, ultimate, petrographic, and physical analyses of 142 diverse U.S. coal samples

USGS Publications Warehouse

Bostick, N.H.; Daws, T.A.

1994-01-01

Basic research on coal and oil shale led to automated pyrolysis analysis of petroleum source rocks; most widely used is the Rock-Eval equipment. In order to interpret Rock-Eval analyses in relation to traditional coal data, we analyzed 142 commercial coals with diverse rank, age, maceral and sulfur contents, for most regions of the United States. We compared the Rock-Eval data with traditional industrial coal data, including volatile matter, calorific value, hydrogen and oxygen content, free swelling index, and vitrinite reflectance. We found: (1) there is a close relationship between Tmax and vitrinite reflectance in the ranges 420-590??C Tmax and 0.4-3%Romax of most coals. (2) A close relationship between Tmax and volatile matter (%VM) extends through the entire sample range, including low-rank samples with 35-70% VM, a range where %VM is not considered to be a useful rank parameter. (3) TOC of medium- and high-rank coals is seriously under-measured by Rock-Eval; TOC of low-rank coals (less than 0.8%Romax) is close to "dry basis" carbon from ultimate analysis. (4) The direct relationships between oxygen index (OI) and %O and between hydrogen index (HI) and %H are clear, though only broadly defined. However, there is virtually no band of concentrated data points on the HI versus OI pseudo-Van Krevelen diagram comparable to the "development line" on the H/C versus O/C diagram. (5) There are systematic relationships between Rock-Eval and industrial coal parameters such as calorific value and FSI, but much standardization would be needed before Rock-Eval could find a place in the coal industry. Tests with blends of coal and quartz sand and with various loads of coal alone showed that the amount of organic matter in the Rock-Eval load greatly influences results. Total load in the crucible, if largely inert, plays a small role, however. Increasing absolute or relative coal content causes under-evaluation of Rock-Eval TOC and over-rating of hydrogen. Blends of several

Assessment of Advanced Coal Gasification Processes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

McCarthy, John; Ferrall, Joseph; Charng, Thomas; Houseman, John

1981-01-01

This report represents a technical assessment of the following advanced coal gasification processes: AVCO High Throughput Gasification (HTG) Process; Bell Single-Stage High Mass Flux (HMF) Process; Cities Service/Rockwell (CS/R) Hydrogasification Process; Exxon Catalytic Coal Gasification (CCG) Process. Each process is evaluated for its potential to produce SNG from a bituminous coal. In addition to identifying the new technology these processes represent, key similarities/differences, strengths/weaknesses, and potential improvements to each process are identified. The AVCO HTG and the Bell HMF gasifiers share similarities with respect to: short residence time (SRT), high throughput rate, slagging and syngas as the initial raw product gas. The CS/R Hydrogasifier is also SRT but is non-slagging and produces a raw gas high in methane content. The Exxon CCG gasifier is a long residence time, catalytic, fluidbed reactor producing all of the raw product methane in the gasifier. The report makes the following assessments: 1) while each process has significant potential as coal gasifiers, the CS/R and Exxon processes are better suited for SNG production; 2) the Exxon process is the closest to a commercial level for near-term SNG production; and 3) the SRT processes require significant development including scale-up and turndown demonstration, char processing and/or utilization demonstration, and reactor control and safety features development.

OCT despeckling via weighted nuclear norm constrained non-local low-rank representation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tang, Chang; Zheng, Xiao; Cao, Lijuan

2017-10-01

As a non-invasive imaging modality, optical coherence tomography (OCT) plays an important role in medical sciences. However, OCT images are always corrupted by speckle noise, which can mask image features and pose significant challenges for medical analysis. In this work, we propose an OCT despeckling method by using non-local, low-rank representation with weighted nuclear norm constraint. Unlike previous non-local low-rank representation based OCT despeckling methods, we first generate a guidance image to improve the non-local group patches selection quality, then a low-rank optimization model with a weighted nuclear norm constraint is formulated to process the selected group patches. The corrupted probability of each pixel is also integrated into the model as a weight to regularize the representation error term. Note that each single patch might belong to several groups, hence different estimates of each patch are aggregated to obtain its final despeckled result. Both qualitative and quantitative experimental results on real OCT images show the superior performance of the proposed method compared with other state-of-the-art speckle removal techniques.

Regulation of coal polymer degradation by fungi. Eighth quarterly report, [April--June 1996

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Irvine, R.L.; Bumpus, J.A.

1996-07-28

This project addresses the solubilization of low-rank coal (leonardite) by lignin degrading fungi. During this reporting period efforts were focused on determining the effect of pH on coal solubilization by oxalate ion and other biologically important compounds that might function as metal chelators, on the role of laccase in coal solubilization and metabolism, on decolorization of soluble coal macromolecule by Phanerochaete chrysosporium and T. versicolor in solid agar media, and on solubilization of coal in slurry cultures and solid phase reactors.

Rankings in Institutional Strategies and Processes: Impact or Illusion?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hazelkorn, Ellen; Loukkola, Tia; Zhang, Thérèse

2014-01-01

The "Rankings in Institutional Strategies and Processes" (RISP) project is the first pan-European study of the impact and influence of rankings on European higher education institutions. The project has sought to build understanding of how rankings impact and influence the development of institutional strategies and processes and its…

Process for forming coal compacts and product thereof

DOEpatents

Gunnink, Brett; Kanunar, Jayanth; Liang, Zhuoxiong

2002-01-01

A process for forming durable, mechanically strong compacts from coal particulates without use of a binder is disclosed. The process involves applying a compressive stress to a particulate feed comprising substantially water-saturated coal particles while the feed is heated to a final compaction temperature in excess of about 100.degree. C. The water present in the feed remains substantially in the liquid phase throughout the compact forming process. This is achieved by heating and compressing the particulate feed and cooling the formed compact at a pressure sufficient to prevent water present in the feed from boiling. The compacts produced by the process have a moisture content near their water saturation point. As a result, these compacts absorb little water and retain exceptional mechanical strength when immersed in high pressure water. The process can be used to form large, cylindrically-shaped compacts from coal particles (i.e., "coal logs") so that the coal can be transported in a hydraulic coal log pipeline.

Low back pain and lumbar angles in Turkish coal miners

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sarikaya, S.; Ozdolap, S.; Gumustas, S.

This study was designed to assess the incidence of low back pain among Turkish coal miners and to investigate the relationship between angles of the lumbar spine and low back pain in coal miners. Fifty underground workers (Group I) and 38 age-matched surface workers (Group II) were included in the study. All the subjects were asked about low back pain in the past 5 years. The prevalence of low back pain was higher in Group I than in Group II (78.0%, 32.4%, respectively, P {lt} 0.001). The results of the study showed that low back pain occurred in 78.0% ofmore » Turkish coal miners. Although the nature of the occupation may have influenced coal miners' lumbar spinal curvature, lumbar angles are not a determinant for low back pain in this population. Further extensive studies involving ergonomic measurements are needed to validate our results for Turkish coal mining industry.« less

Process for electrochemically gasifying coal using electromagnetism

DOEpatents

Botts, Thomas E.; Powell, James R.

1987-01-01

A process for electrochemically gasifying coal by establishing a flowing stream of coal particulate slurry, electrolyte and electrode members through a transverse magnetic field that has sufficient strength to polarize the electrode members, thereby causing them to operate in combination with the electrolyte to electrochemically reduce the coal particulate in the slurry. Such electrochemical reduction of the coal produces hydrogen and carbon dioxide at opposite ends of the polarized electrode members. Gas collection means are operated in conjunction with the process to collect the evolved gases as they rise from the slurry and electrolyte solution.

Low-Rank Correction Methods for Algebraic Domain Decomposition Preconditioners

DOE PAGES

Li, Ruipeng; Saad, Yousef

2017-08-01

This study presents a parallel preconditioning method for distributed sparse linear systems, based on an approximate inverse of the original matrix, that adopts a general framework of distributed sparse matrices and exploits domain decomposition (DD) and low-rank corrections. The DD approach decouples the matrix and, once inverted, a low-rank approximation is applied by exploiting the Sherman--Morrison--Woodbury formula, which yields two variants of the preconditioning methods. The low-rank expansion is computed by the Lanczos procedure with reorthogonalizations. Numerical experiments indicate that, when combined with Krylov subspace accelerators, this preconditioner can be efficient and robust for solving symmetric sparse linear systems. Comparisonsmore » with pARMS, a DD-based parallel incomplete LU (ILU) preconditioning method, are presented for solving Poisson's equation and linear elasticity problems.« less

Low-Rank Correction Methods for Algebraic Domain Decomposition Preconditioners

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Li, Ruipeng; Saad, Yousef

This study presents a parallel preconditioning method for distributed sparse linear systems, based on an approximate inverse of the original matrix, that adopts a general framework of distributed sparse matrices and exploits domain decomposition (DD) and low-rank corrections. The DD approach decouples the matrix and, once inverted, a low-rank approximation is applied by exploiting the Sherman--Morrison--Woodbury formula, which yields two variants of the preconditioning methods. The low-rank expansion is computed by the Lanczos procedure with reorthogonalizations. Numerical experiments indicate that, when combined with Krylov subspace accelerators, this preconditioner can be efficient and robust for solving symmetric sparse linear systems. Comparisonsmore » with pARMS, a DD-based parallel incomplete LU (ILU) preconditioning method, are presented for solving Poisson's equation and linear elasticity problems.« less

Geochemical investigation of the potential for mobilizing non-methane hydrocarbons during carbon dioxide storage in deep coal beds

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolak, J.J.; Burruss, R.C.

2006-01-01

Coal samples of different rank (lignite to anthracite) were extracted in the laboratory with supercritical CO2 (40 ??C; 10 MPa) to evaluate the potential for mobilizing non-methane hydrocarbons during CO2 storage (sequestration) or enhanced coal bed methane recovery from deep (???1-km depth) coal beds. The total measured alkane concentrations mobilized from the coal samples ranged from 3.0 to 64 g tonne-1 of dry coal. The highest alkane concentration was measured in the lignite sample extract; the lowest was measured in the anthracite sample extract. Substantial concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) were also mobilized from these samples: 3.1 - 91 g tonne-1 of dry coal. The greatest amounts of PAHs were mobilized from the high-volatile bituminous coal samples. The distributions of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons mobilized from the coal samples also varied with rank. In general, these variations mimicked the chemical changes that occur with increasing degrees of coalification and thermal maturation. For example, the amount of PAHs mobilized from coal samples paralleled the general trend of bitumen formation with increasing coal rank. The coal samples yielded hydrocarbons during consecutive extractions with supercritical CO2, although the amount of hydrocarbons mobilized declined with each successive extraction. These results demonstrate that the potential for supercritical CO2 to mobilize non-methane hydrocarbons from coal beds, and the effect of coal rank on this process, are important to consider when evaluating deep coal beds for CO2 storage.

Process for selective grinding of coal

DOEpatents

Venkatachari, Mukund K.; Benz, August D.; Huettenhain, Horst

1991-01-01

A process for preparing coal for use as a fuel. Forming a coal-water slurry having solid coal particles with a particle size not exceeding about 80 microns, transferring the coal-water slurry to a solid bowl centrifuge, and operating same to classify the ground coal-water slurry to provide a centrate containing solid particles with a particle size distribution of from about 5 microns to about 20 microns and a centrifuge cake of solids having a particle size distribution of from about 10 microns to about 80 microns. The classifer cake is reground and mixed with fresh feed to the solid bowl centrifuge for additional classification.

Dual Low-Rank Pursuit: Learning Salient Features for Saliency Detection.

PubMed

Lang, Congyan; Feng, Jiashi; Feng, Songhe; Wang, Jingdong; Yan, Shuicheng

2016-06-01

Saliency detection is an important procedure for machines to understand visual world as humans do. In this paper, we consider a specific saliency detection problem of predicting human eye fixations when they freely view natural images, and propose a novel dual low-rank pursuit (DLRP) method. DLRP learns saliency-aware feature transformations by utilizing available supervision information and constructs discriminative bases for effectively detecting human fixation points under the popular low-rank and sparsity-pursuit framework. Benefiting from the embedded high-level information in the supervised learning process, DLRP is able to predict fixations accurately without performing the expensive object segmentation as in the previous works. Comprehensive experiments clearly show the superiority of the proposed DLRP method over the established state-of-the-art methods. We also empirically demonstrate that DLRP provides stronger generalization performance across different data sets and inherits the advantages of both the bottom-up- and top-down-based saliency detection methods.

Fired heater for coal liquefaction process

DOEpatents

Ying, David H. S.; McDermott, Wayne T.; Givens, Edwin N.

1985-01-01

A fired heater for a coal liquefaction process is operated under conditions to maximize the slurry slug frequency and thereby improve the heat transfer efficiency. The operating conditions controlled are (1) the pipe diameter and pipe arrangement, (2) the minimum coal/solvent slurry velocity, (3) the maximum gas superficial velocity, and (4) the range of the volumetric flow velocity ratio of gas to coal/solvent slurry.

Temporal Restricted Visual Tracking Via Reverse-Low-Rank Sparse Learning.

PubMed

Yang, Yehui; Hu, Wenrui; Xie, Yuan; Zhang, Wensheng; Zhang, Tianzhu

2017-02-01

An effective representation model, which aims to mine the most meaningful information in the data, plays an important role in visual tracking. Some recent particle-filter-based trackers achieve promising results by introducing the low-rank assumption into the representation model. However, their assumed low-rank structure of candidates limits the robustness when facing severe challenges such as abrupt motion. To avoid the above limitation, we propose a temporal restricted reverse-low-rank learning algorithm for visual tracking with the following advantages: 1) the reverse-low-rank model jointly represents target and background templates via candidates, which exploits the low-rank structure among consecutive target observations and enforces the temporal consistency of target in a global level; 2) the appearance consistency may be broken when target suffers from sudden changes. To overcome this issue, we propose a local constraint via l 1,2 mixed-norm, which can not only ensures the local consistency of target appearance, but also tolerates the sudden changes between two adjacent frames; and 3) to alleviate the inference of unreasonable representation values due to outlier candidates, an adaptive weighted scheme is designed to improve the robustness of the tracker. By evaluating on 26 challenge video sequences, the experiments show the effectiveness and favorable performance of the proposed algorithm against 12 state-of-the-art visual trackers.

Characterization of coal liquids derived from the H-coal process

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Holmes, S.A.; Woodward, P.W.; Sturm, G.P. Jr.

1976-11-01

Compositional data of coal liquid products derived from the H-Coal process were obtained. Two overhead products (one from the fuel oil mode of operation and the other from the syncrude mode of operation) were prepared by Hydrocarbon Research, Inc. from Illinois No. 6 coal. The compositional data of these products are tabulated, and characteristics of the materials are discussed. Separation and characterization methods, with slight modification, as developed by the Bureau of Mines-API Research Project 60 for characterizing heavy ends of petroleum, were successfully used in analyzing coal liquid distillates within the boiling range 200/sup 0/ to 540/sup 0/C. Distillatesmore » boiling below 200/sup 0/C were separated and analyzed using chromatographic and spectral techniques.« less

Low-rank Atlas Image Analyses in the Presence of Pathologies

PubMed Central

Liu, Xiaoxiao; Niethammer, Marc; Kwitt, Roland; Singh, Nikhil; McCormick, Matt; Aylward, Stephen

2015-01-01

We present a common framework, for registering images to an atlas and for forming an unbiased atlas, that tolerates the presence of pathologies such as tumors and traumatic brain injury lesions. This common framework is particularly useful when a sufficient number of protocol-matched scans from healthy subjects cannot be easily acquired for atlas formation and when the pathologies in a patient cause large appearance changes. Our framework combines a low-rank-plus-sparse image decomposition technique with an iterative, diffeomorphic, group-wise image registration method. At each iteration of image registration, the decomposition technique estimates a “healthy” version of each image as its low-rank component and estimates the pathologies in each image as its sparse component. The healthy version of each image is used for the next iteration of image registration. The low-rank and sparse estimates are refined as the image registrations iteratively improve. When that framework is applied to image-to-atlas registration, the low-rank image is registered to a pre-defined atlas, to establish correspondence that is independent of the pathologies in the sparse component of each image. Ultimately, image-to-atlas registrations can be used to define spatial priors for tissue segmentation and to map information across subjects. When that framework is applied to unbiased atlas formation, at each iteration, the average of the low-rank images from the patients is used as the atlas image for the next iteration, until convergence. Since each iteration’s atlas is comprised of low-rank components, it provides a population-consistent, pathology-free appearance. Evaluations of the proposed methodology are presented using synthetic data as well as simulated and clinical tumor MRI images from the brain tumor segmentation (BRATS) challenge from MICCAI 2012. PMID:26111390

CT Image Sequence Restoration Based on Sparse and Low-Rank Decomposition

PubMed Central

Gou, Shuiping; Wang, Yueyue; Wang, Zhilong; Peng, Yong; Zhang, Xiaopeng; Jiao, Licheng; Wu, Jianshe

2013-01-01

Blurry organ boundaries and soft tissue structures present a major challenge in biomedical image restoration. In this paper, we propose a low-rank decomposition-based method for computed tomography (CT) image sequence restoration, where the CT image sequence is decomposed into a sparse component and a low-rank component. A new point spread function of Weiner filter is employed to efficiently remove blur in the sparse component; a wiener filtering with the Gaussian PSF is used to recover the average image of the low-rank component. And then we get the recovered CT image sequence by combining the recovery low-rank image with all recovery sparse image sequence. Our method achieves restoration results with higher contrast, sharper organ boundaries and richer soft tissue structure information, compared with existing CT image restoration methods. The robustness of our method was assessed with numerical experiments using three different low-rank models: Robust Principle Component Analysis (RPCA), Linearized Alternating Direction Method with Adaptive Penalty (LADMAP) and Go Decomposition (GoDec). Experimental results demonstrated that the RPCA model was the most suitable for the small noise CT images whereas the GoDec model was the best for the large noisy CT images. PMID:24023764

An Organic Geochemical Assessment of CO2-Coal Interactions During Sequestration

USGS Publications Warehouse

Kolak, Jonathan J.; Burruss, Robert A.

2003-01-01

Three well-characterized coal samples of varying rank were extracted with supercritical CO2 to determine the amount of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) that could be mobilized during simulated CO2 injection/sequestration in deep coal beds. The supercritical CO2 extractions were conducted at 40?C and 100 bars, roughly corresponding to a depth of 1 km. The greatest amount of PAHs was extracted from the high-volatile C bituminous coal sample. Extracts from the subbituminous C and anthracite coal samples contained lower concentrations of these compounds. The effectiveness of supercritical CO2 in liberating PAHs from the coal sample was evaluated in a comparison with a parallel series of Soxhlet extractions using 100% dichloromethane. More PAHs were extracted from the lower rank coal samples with dichloromethane than with supercritical CO2. The results from this investigation indicate that, regardless of coal rank, CO2 injection into deep coal beds may mobilize PAHs from the coal matrix. However, more PAHs could be mobilized during CO2 sequestration in a high-volatile C bituminous coal bed than in either of the other two coal ranks studied.

Fast Low-Rank Bayesian Matrix Completion With Hierarchical Gaussian Prior Models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, Linxiao; Fang, Jun; Duan, Huiping; Li, Hongbin; Zeng, Bing

2018-06-01

The problem of low rank matrix completion is considered in this paper. To exploit the underlying low-rank structure of the data matrix, we propose a hierarchical Gaussian prior model, where columns of the low-rank matrix are assumed to follow a Gaussian distribution with zero mean and a common precision matrix, and a Wishart distribution is specified as a hyperprior over the precision matrix. We show that such a hierarchical Gaussian prior has the potential to encourage a low-rank solution. Based on the proposed hierarchical prior model, a variational Bayesian method is developed for matrix completion, where the generalized approximate massage passing (GAMP) technique is embedded into the variational Bayesian inference in order to circumvent cumbersome matrix inverse operations. Simulation results show that our proposed method demonstrates superiority over existing state-of-the-art matrix completion methods.

Integrated coal cleaning, liquefaction, and gasification process

DOEpatents

Chervenak, Michael C.

1980-01-01

Coal is finely ground and cleaned so as to preferentially remove denser ash-containing particles along with some coal. The resulting cleaned coal portion having reduced ash content is then fed to a coal hydrogenation system for the production of desirable hydrocarbon gases and liquid products. The remaining ash-enriched coal portion is gasified to produce a synthesis gas, the ash is removed from the gasifier usually as slag, and the synthesis gas is shift converted with steam and purified to produce the high purity hydrogen needed in the coal hydrogenation system. This overall process increases the utilization of as-mined coal, reduces the problems associated with ash in the liquefaction-hydrogenation system, and permits a desirable simplification of a liquids-solids separation step otherwise required in the coal hydrogenation system.

Mercury capture by native fly ash carbons in coal-fired power plants

PubMed Central

Hower, James C.; Senior, Constance L.; Suuberg, Eric M.; Hurt, Robert H.; Wilcox, Jennifer L.; Olson, Edwin S.

2013-01-01

The control of mercury in the air emissions from coal-fired power plants is an on-going challenge. The native unburned carbons in fly ash can capture varying amounts of Hg depending upon the temperature and composition of the flue gas at the air pollution control device, with Hg capture increasing with a decrease in temperature; the amount of carbon in the fly ash, with Hg capture increasing with an increase in carbon; and the form of the carbon and the consequent surface area of the carbon, with Hg capture increasing with an increase in surface area. The latter is influenced by the rank of the feed coal, with carbons derived from the combustion of low-rank coals having a greater surface area than carbons from bituminous- and anthracite-rank coals. The chemistry of the feed coal and the resulting composition of the flue gas enhances Hg capture by fly ash carbons. This is particularly evident in the correlation of feed coal Cl content to Hg oxidation to HgCl2, enhancing Hg capture. Acid gases, including HCl and H2SO4 and the combination of HCl and NO2, in the flue gas can enhance the oxidation of Hg. In this presentation, we discuss the transport of Hg through the boiler and pollution control systems, the mechanisms of Hg oxidation, and the parameters controlling Hg capture by coal-derived fly ash carbons. PMID:24223466

Studies of coupled chemical and catalytic coal conversion methods. Fifth quarterly report, October--December 1988

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Stock, L.M.

1988-12-31

Liquefaction of coal by depolymerization in an organic solvent has been studied for several years. The liquefied coal extract which results from such a process is far more suitable for conversion into liquid fuel by hydrogenolysis than is the untreated coal. Investigations on the chemical structure and the reactive sites of coal can help to select useful reactions for the production of liquids from coal. Sternberg et al. demonstrated that the reductive alkylation method transforms bituminous coal into an enormously soluble substance, irrespective of the mild reaction conditions. The effectiveness of newly introduced alkyl groups for the disruption of intermolecularmore » hydrogen bonds and pi-pi interactions between the aromatic sheets in coal macromolecules has been recognized. It has been reported by Ignasiak et al. that a C-alkylabon reaction using sodium or potassium amide in liquid ammonia can be used to introduce alkyl groups at acidic carbon sites. A method has been developed recently in this laboratory for the solubilization of high rank coals. In the previous reports it was shown that n-butyl lithium and potassium t-butoxide in refluxing heptane produced coal anions which could be alkylated with different alkyl halides. Such alkylated coals were soluble up to 92% in solvents like pyridine. Though the solubilization of coal depended very much on the length of the alkyl group, it also depended very much on the nature of the base used. Strong bases like n-butyl lithium (pKa=42) can cause proton abstraction from aromatic structures, if the more acidic benzylic protons are absent. The utility of this procedure, initially developed and used by Miyake and Stock, has now been tested with the high oxygen containing, low rank Illinois No. 6 and Wyodak coals.« less

Processes in ranking nutrients of foods in a food data base.

PubMed

Khan, A S

1996-01-01

Depending on the type of user, it is possible that there are many purposes for retrieval of foods from a computerised nutrient data base. A Dietitian on one occasion may need to come up with a qualified assessment of foods in the process of diet construction so that the process of balancing nutrients for the diet takes less time. On another occasion the dietitian may want to recommend a food for a client which requires knowledge of the standing of that food with respect to one or more of its contents of nutrients. A dietitian is not able to memorise all the foods and their nutrient content. Moreover if the number of foods is many then the dietitian's ability to refer foods according to their standing may become impossible. Ranking foods with respect to their nutrient contents within a reasonable number could be very useful for dietetic purposes. This paper discusses the processes of ranking of foods as high, medium and low only, and proposes guidelines which can be referred to for rejecting inappropriate ranking schemes of foods. The proposed guidelines are based on the results of experiments which are included in this paper.

Scalable Nonparametric Low-Rank Kernel Learning Using Block Coordinate Descent.

PubMed

Hu, En-Liang; Kwok, James T

2015-09-01

Nonparametric kernel learning (NPKL) is a flexible approach to learn the kernel matrix directly without assuming any parametric form. It can be naturally formulated as a semidefinite program (SDP), which, however, is not very scalable. To address this problem, we propose the combined use of low-rank approximation and block coordinate descent (BCD). Low-rank approximation avoids the expensive positive semidefinite constraint in the SDP by replacing the kernel matrix variable with V(T)V, where V is a low-rank matrix. The resultant nonlinear optimization problem is then solved by BCD, which optimizes each column of V sequentially. It can be shown that the proposed algorithm has nice convergence properties and low computational complexities. Experiments on a number of real-world data sets show that the proposed algorithm outperforms state-of-the-art NPKL solvers.

Coal desulfurization process

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hsu, G. C.; Gavalas, G. R.; Ganguli, P. S.; Kalfayan, S. H.

1978-01-01

A method for chlorinolysis of coal is an organic solvent at a moderate temperautre and atmospheric pressure has been proven to be effective in removing sulfur, particularly the organic sulfur, from coal. Chlorine gas is bubbled through a slurry of moist coal in chlorinated solvent. The chlorinated coal is separated, hydrolyzed and the dechlorinated. Preliminary results of treating a high sulfutr (4.77%S) bituminous coal show that up to 70% organic sulfur, 90% hyritic sulfur and 76% total sulfur can be removed. The treated coal is dechlorinated by heating at 500 C. The presence of moisture helps to remove organic sulfur.

Development of the chemical and electrochemical coal cleaning process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Basilio, C. I.; Yoon, Roe-Hoan

The continuous testing of the Chemical and Electrochemical Coal Cleaning (CECC) was completed successfully using Middle Wyodak and Elkhorn No. 3 coal samples. The CECC unit was run under the optimum conditions established for these coal samples. For the Middle Wyodak coal, the ash content was reduced from 6.96 percent to as low 1.61 percent, corresponding to an ash rejection (by weight) of about 83 percent. The ash and sulfur contents of the Elkhorn No. 3 coal were reduced to as low as 1.8 percent and 0.9 percent. The average ash and sulfur rejections were calculated to be around 84 percent and 47 percent. The CECC continuous unit was used to treat -325 mesh Elkhorn No. 3 coal samples and gave ash and sulfur rejection values of as high as 77 percent and 66 percent. In these test, the clean -325 mesh coal particles were separated from the liberated mineral matter through microbubble column flotation, instead of wet-screening.

Trends and anomalies in gas evolution from coal samples

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Vorres, K.S.

1993-09-01

As part of the stability studies on these sealed samples a number of the samples were given to the Analytical Chemistry Laboratory at ANL for periodic gas analysis. 1. Higher rank coals evolve methane, and lower rank coals evolve carbon dioxide with some evolution of both gases for the intermediate ranks. 2. The evolution proceeds over times of years for pulverized coals in sealed ampules. 3. Gas concentrations are higher above -20 mesh samples than above -100 mesh material. 4. Carbon monoxide is not evolved.

Lung dynamic MRI deblurring using low-rank decomposition and dictionary learning.

PubMed

Gou, Shuiping; Wang, Yueyue; Wu, Jiaolong; Lee, Percy; Sheng, Ke

2015-04-01

Lung dynamic MRI (dMRI) has emerged to be an appealing tool to quantify lung motion for both planning and treatment guidance purposes. However, this modality can result in blurry images due to intrinsically low signal-to-noise ratio in the lung and spatial/temporal interpolation. The image blurring could adversely affect the image processing that depends on the availability of fine landmarks. The purpose of this study is to reduce dMRI blurring using image postprocessing. To enhance the image quality and exploit the spatiotemporal continuity of dMRI sequences, a low-rank decomposition and dictionary learning (LDDL) method was employed to deblur lung dMRI and enhance the conspicuity of lung blood vessels. Fifty frames of continuous 2D coronal dMRI frames using a steady state free precession sequence were obtained from five subjects including two healthy volunteer and three lung cancer patients. In LDDL, the lung dMRI was decomposed into sparse and low-rank components. Dictionary learning was employed to estimate the blurring kernel based on the whole image, low-rank or sparse component of the first image in the lung MRI sequence. Deblurring was performed on the whole image sequences using deconvolution based on the estimated blur kernel. The deblurring results were quantified using an automated blood vessel extraction method based on the classification of Hessian matrix filtered images. Accuracy of automated extraction was calculated using manual segmentation of the blood vessels as the ground truth. In the pilot study, LDDL based on the blurring kernel estimated from the sparse component led to performance superior to the other ways of kernel estimation. LDDL consistently improved image contrast and fine feature conspicuity of the original MRI without introducing artifacts. The accuracy of automated blood vessel extraction was on average increased by 16% using manual segmentation as the ground truth. Image blurring in dMRI images can be effectively reduced using a

Low-Rank Discriminant Embedding for Multiview Learning.

PubMed

Li, Jingjing; Wu, Yue; Zhao, Jidong; Lu, Ke

2017-11-01

This paper focuses on the specific problem of multiview learning where samples have the same feature set but different probability distributions, e.g., different viewpoints or different modalities. Since samples lying in different distributions cannot be compared directly, this paper aims to learn a latent subspace shared by multiple views assuming that the input views are generated from this latent subspace. Previous approaches usually learn the common subspace by either maximizing the empirical likelihood, or preserving the geometric structure. However, considering the complementarity between the two objectives, this paper proposes a novel approach, named low-rank discriminant embedding (LRDE), for multiview learning by taking full advantage of both sides. By further considering the duality between data points and features of multiview scene, i.e., data points can be grouped based on their distribution on features, while features can be grouped based on their distribution on the data points, LRDE not only deploys low-rank constraints on both sample level and feature level to dig out the shared factors across different views, but also preserves geometric information in both the ambient sample space and the embedding feature space by designing a novel graph structure under the framework of graph embedding. Finally, LRDE jointly optimizes low-rank representation and graph embedding in a unified framework. Comprehensive experiments in both multiview manner and pairwise manner demonstrate that LRDE performs much better than previous approaches proposed in recent literatures.

USE OF COAL DRYING TO REDUCE WATER CONSUMED IN PULVERIZED COAL POWER PLANTS

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Edward K. Levy; Nenad Sarunac; Harun Bilirgen

2006-03-01

U.S. low rank coals contain relatively large amounts of moisture, with the moisture content of subbituminous coals typically ranging from 15 to 30 percent and that for lignites from 25 and 40 percent. High fuel moisture has several adverse impacts on the operation of a pulverized coal generating unit, for it can result in fuel handling problems and it affects heat rate, stack emissions and maintenance costs. Theoretical analyses and coal test burns performed at a lignite fired power plant show that by reducing the fuel moisture, it is possible to improve boiler performance and unit heat rate, reduce emissionsmore » and reduce water consumption by the evaporative cooling tower. The economic viability of the approach and the actual impact of the drying system on water consumption, unit heat rate and stack emissions will depend critically on the design and operating conditions of the drying system. The present project evaluated the low temperature drying of high moisture coals using power plant waste heat to provide the energy required for drying. Coal drying studies were performed in a laboratory scale fluidized bed dryer to gather data and develop models on drying kinetics. In addition, analyses were carried out to determine the relative costs and performance impacts (in terms of heat rate, cooling tower water consumption and emissions) of drying along with the development of optimized drying system designs and recommended operating conditions.« less

Nuclear magnetic resonance studies of ancient buried wood-II. Observations on the origin of coal from lignite to bituminous coal

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hatcher, P.G.; Breger, I.A.; Szeverenyi, N.; Maciel, G.E.

1982-01-01

Coalified logs ranging in age from Late Pennsylvania to Miocene and in rank from lignite B to bituminous coal were analyzed by 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) utilizing the cross-polarization, magic-angle spinning technique, as well as by infrared spectroscopy. The results of this study indicate that at least three major stages of coalification can be observed as wood gradually undergoes transformation to bituminous coal. The first stage involves hydrolysis and loss of cellulose from wood with retention and differential concentration of the resistant lignin. The second stage involves conversion of the lignin residues directly to coalified wood of lignitic rank, during which the oxygen content of intermediate diagenetic products remains constant as the hydrogen content and the carbon content increases. These changes are thought to involve loss of methoxyl groups, water, and C3 side chains from the lignin. In the third major stage of coalification, the coalified wood increases in rank to subbituminous and bituminous coal; during this stage the oxygen content decreases, hydrogen remains constant, and the carbon content increases. These changes are thought to result from loss of soluble humic acids that are rich in oxygen and that are mobilized during compaction and dewatering. Relatively resistant resinous substances are differentially concentrated in the coal during this stage. The hypothesis that humic acids are formed as mobile by-products of the coalification of lignin and function only as vehicles for removal of oxygen represents a dramatic departure from commonly accepted views that they are relatively low-molecular-weight intermediates formed during the degradation of lignin that then condense to form high-molecular-weight coal structures. ?? 1982.

Memory Efficient Ranking.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moffat, Alistair; And Others

1994-01-01

Describes an approximate document ranking process that uses a compact array of in-memory, low-precision approximations for document length. Combined with another rule for reducing the memory required by partial similarity accumulators, the approximation heuristic allows the ranking of large document collections using less than one byte of memory…

Combustion and leaching behavior of elements in the argonne premium coal samples

USGS Publications Warehouse

Finkelman, R.B.; Palmer, C.A.; Krasnow, M.R.; Aruscavage, P. J.; Sellers, G.A.; Dulong, F.T.

1990-01-01

Eight Argonne Premium Coal samples and two other coal samples were used to observe the effects of combustion and leaching on 30 elements. The results were used to infer the modes of occurrence of these elements. Instrumental neutron activation analysis indicates that the effects of combustion and leaching on many elements varied markedly among the samples. As much as 90% of the selenium and bromine is volatilized from the bituminous coal samples, but substantially less is volatilized from the low-rank coals. We interpret the combustion and leaching behavior of these elements to indicate that they are associated with the organic fraction. Sodium, although nonvolatile, is ion-exchangeable in most samples, particularly in the low-rank coal samples where it is likely to be associated with the organic constituents. Potassium is primarily in an ion-exchangeable form in the Wypdak coal but is in HF-soluble phases (probably silicates) in most other samples. Cesium is in an unidentified HNO3-soluble phase in most samples. Virtually all the strontium and barium in the low-rank coal samples is removed by NH4OAc followed by HCl, indicating that these elements probably occur in both organic and inorganic phases. Most tungsten and tantalum are in insoluble phases, perhaps as oxides or in organic association. Hafnium is generally insoluble, but as much as 65% is HF soluble, perhaps due to the presence of very fine grained or metamict zircon. We interpret the leaching behavior of uranium to indicate its occurrence in chelates and its association with silicates and with zircon. Most of the rare-earth elements (REE) and thorium appear to be associated with phosphates. Differences in textural relationships may account for some of the differences in leaching behavior of the REE among samples. Zinc occurs predominantly in sphalerite. Either the remaining elements occur in several different modes of occurrence (scandium, iron), or the leaching data are equivocal (arsenic, antimony

Hydrocarbon source potential and maturation in eocene New Zealand vitrinite-rich coals: Insights from traditional coal analyses, and Rock-Eval and biomarker studies

USGS Publications Warehouse

Newman, J.; Price, L.C.; Johnston, J.H.

1997-01-01

The results of traditional methods of coal characterisation (proximate, specific energy, and ultimate analyses) for 28 Eocene coal samples from the West Coast of New Zealand correspond well with biomarker ratios and Rock-Eval analyses. Isorank variations in vitrinite fluorescence and reflectance recorded for these samples are closely related to their volatile-matter content, and therefore indicate that the original vitrinite chemistry is a key controlling factor. By contrast, the mineral-matter content and the proportion of coal macerals present appear to have had only a minor influence on the coal samples' properties. Our analyses indicate that a number of triterpane biomarker ratios show peak maturities by high volatile bituminous A rank; apparent maturities are then reversed and decline at the higher medium volatile bituminous rank. The Rock-Eval S1 +S2 yield also maximizes by high volatile bituminous A rank, and then declines; however, this decline is retarded in samples with the most hydrogen-rich (perhydrous) vitrinites. These Rock-Eval and biomarker trends, as well as trends in traditional coal analyses, are used to define the rank at which expulsion of gas and oil occurs from the majority of the coals. This expulsion commences at high volatile A bituminous rank, and persists up to the threshold of medium volatile bituminous rank (c. 1.1% Ro ran. or 1.2% Ro max in this sample set), where marked hydrocarbon expulsion from perhydrous vitrinites begins to take place.

Evaluating the Energy Recovery Potential of Nigerian Coals under Non-Isothermal Thermogravimetry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bevan Nyakuma, Bemgba; Oladokun, Olagoke; Jauro, Aliyu; Damian Nyakuma, Denen

2017-07-01

This study investigated the fuel properties and energy recovery potential of two coal samples from Ihioma (IHM) and Ogboligbo (OGB) environs in Nigeria. The ultimate, proximate, and bomb calorimetric analyses of the coal were examined. Next, the rank classification and potential application of the coals were evaluated according to the ASTM standard D388. Lastly, thermal decomposition behaviour was examined by non-isothermal thermogravimetry (TG) under pyrolysis conditions from 30 - 900 °C. The results indicated IHM and OGB contain high proportions of combustible elements for potential thermal conversion. The higher heating value (HHV) of IHM was 20.37 MJ/kg whereas OGB was 16.33 MJ/kg. TG analysis revealed 55% weight loss for OGB and 76% for IHM. The residual mass was 23% for IHM and 44% for OGB. Based on the temperature profile characteristics (TPCs); Ton , Tmax , and Toff , IHM was more reactive than OGB due to its higher volatile matter (VM). Overall, results revealed the coals are Lignite (Brown) low-rank coals (LRCs) with potential for electric power generation.

Coal recovery process

DOEpatents

Good, Robert J.; Badgujar, Mohan

1992-01-01

A method for the beneficiation of coal by selective agglomeration and the beneficiated coal product thereof is disclosed wherein coal, comprising impurities, is comminuted to a particle size sufficient to allow impurities contained therein to disperse in water, an aqueous slurry is formed with the comminuted coal particles, treated with a compound, such as a polysaccharide and/or disaccharide, to increase the relative hydrophilicity of hydrophilic components, and thereafter the slurry is treated with sufficient liquid agglomerant to form a coagulum comprising reduced impurity coal.

Quality of Selected Hungarian Coals

USGS Publications Warehouse

Landis, E.R.; Rohrbacher, T.J.; Gluskoter, H.J.; Fodor, B.; Gombar, G.

2007-01-01

As part of a program conducted jointly by the U.S. Geological Survey and the Hungarian Geological Survey under the auspices of the United States-Hungarian Science and Technology Fund, a total of 39 samples from five coal mines in Hungary were selected for analysis. The mine areas sampled represent most of the coal mined recently in Hungary. Almost all the coal is used to generate electricity. Coals from the five mines (four underground, one surface) reflect differences in age, depositional setting, organic and inorganic components of the original sediments, and deformational history. Classified according to the ranking system of the American Society for Testing and Materials, the coals range in rank from lignite B (Pliocene[?] coals) to high volatile A bituminous (Jurassic coals). With respect to grade classification, based on seam-weighted averages of moisture, ash, and sulfur contents: (1) all contain high moisture (more than 10 percent), (2) all except the Eocene coals are high (more than 15 percent) in ash yield, and (3) two (Jurassic and Eocene coals) are high in sulfur (more than 3 percent) and three (Cretaceous, Miocene, and Pliocene coals) have medium sulfur contents (1 to 3 percent). Average heat values range from 4,000 to 8,650 British thermal units per pound.

The experimental research on response characteristics of coal samples under the uniaxial loading process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jia, Bing; Wei, Jian-Ping; Wen, Zhi-Hui; Wang, Yun-Gang; Jia, Lin-Xing

2017-11-01

In order to study the response characteristics of infrasound in coal samples under the uniaxial loading process, coal samples were collected from GengCun mine. Coal rock stress loading device, acoustic emission tested system and infrasound tested system were used to test the infrasonic signal and acoustic emission signal under uniaxial loading process. The tested results were analyzed by the methods of wavelet filter, threshold denoise, time-frequency analysis and so on. The results showed that in the loading process, the change of the infrasonic wave displayed the characteristics of stage, and it could be divided into three stages: initial stage with a certain amount infrasound events, middle stage with few infrasound events, and late stage gradual decrease. It had a good consistency with changing characteristics of acoustic emission. At the same time, the frequency of infrasound was very low. It can propagate over a very long distance with little attenuation, and the characteristics of the infrasound before the destruction of the coal samples were obvious. A method of using the infrasound characteristics to predict the destruction of coal samples was proposed. This is of great significance to guide the prediction of geological hazards in coal mines.

The application of low-rank and sparse decomposition method in the field of climatology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gupta, Nitika; Bhaskaran, Prasad K.

2018-04-01

The present study reports a low-rank and sparse decomposition method that separates the mean and the variability of a climate data field. Until now, the application of this technique was limited only in areas such as image processing, web data ranking, and bioinformatics data analysis. In climate science, this method exactly separates the original data into a set of low-rank and sparse components, wherein the low-rank components depict the linearly correlated dataset (expected or mean behavior), and the sparse component represents the variation or perturbation in the dataset from its mean behavior. The study attempts to verify the efficacy of this proposed technique in the field of climatology with two examples of real world. The first example attempts this technique on the maximum wind-speed (MWS) data for the Indian Ocean (IO) region. The study brings to light a decadal reversal pattern in the MWS for the North Indian Ocean (NIO) during the months of June, July, and August (JJA). The second example deals with the sea surface temperature (SST) data for the Bay of Bengal region that exhibits a distinct pattern in the sparse component. The study highlights the importance of the proposed technique used for interpretation and visualization of climate data.

Evolution of Submicrometer Organic Aerosols during a Complete Residential Coal Combustion Process.

PubMed

Zhou, Wei; Jiang, Jingkun; Duan, Lei; Hao, Jiming

2016-07-19

In the absence of particulate matter (PM) control devices, residential coal combustion contributes significantly to ambient PM pollution. Characterizing PM emissions from residential coal combustion with high time resolution is beneficial for developing control policies and evaluating the environmental impact of PM. This study reports the evolution of submicrometer organic aerosols (OA) during a complete residential coal combustion process, that is, from fire start to fire extinction. Three commonly used coal types (bituminous, anthracite, and semicoke coals) were evaluated in a typical residential stove in China. For all three types of coal, the OA emission exhibited distinct characteristics in the four stages, that is, ignition, fierce combustion, relatively stable combustion, and ember combustion. OA emissions during the ignition stage accounted for 58.2-85.4% of the total OA emission of a complete combustion process. The OA concentration decreased rapidly during the fierce combustion stage and remained low during the relatively stable combustion stage. During these two stages, a significant ion peak of m/z 73 from organic acids were observed. The degree of oxidation of the OA increased from the first stage to the last stage. Implications for ambient OA source-apportionment and residential PM emission characterization and control are discussed.

Low-pressure hydrocracking of coal-derived Fischer-Tropsch waxes to diesel

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dieter Leckel

2007-06-15

Coal-derived low-temperature Fischer-Tropsch (LTFT) wax was hydrocracked at pressures of 3.5-7.0 MPa using silica-alumina-supported sulfided NiW/NiMo and an unsulfided noble metal catalyst, modified with MoO{sub 3}. A low-pressure operation at 3.5 MPa produced a highly isomerized diesel, having low cloud points (from -12 to -28{sup o}C) combined with high cetane numbers (69-73). These properties together with the extremely low sulfur ({lt}5 ppm) and aromatic ({lt}0.5%) contents place coal/liquid (CTL) derived distillates as highly valuable blending components to achieve Eurograde diesel specifications. The upgrading of coal-based LTFT waxes through hydrocracking to high-quality diesel fuel blend components in combination with commercial-feasible coal-integratedmore » gasification combined cycle (coal-IGCC) CO{sub 2} capture and storage schemes should make CTL technology more attractive. 28 refs., 7 figs., 8 tabs.« less

Efficient Multiple Kernel Learning Algorithms Using Low-Rank Representation.

PubMed

Niu, Wenjia; Xia, Kewen; Zu, Baokai; Bai, Jianchuan

2017-01-01

Unlike Support Vector Machine (SVM), Multiple Kernel Learning (MKL) allows datasets to be free to choose the useful kernels based on their distribution characteristics rather than a precise one. It has been shown in the literature that MKL holds superior recognition accuracy compared with SVM, however, at the expense of time consuming computations. This creates analytical and computational difficulties in solving MKL algorithms. To overcome this issue, we first develop a novel kernel approximation approach for MKL and then propose an efficient Low-Rank MKL (LR-MKL) algorithm by using the Low-Rank Representation (LRR). It is well-acknowledged that LRR can reduce dimension while retaining the data features under a global low-rank constraint. Furthermore, we redesign the binary-class MKL as the multiclass MKL based on pairwise strategy. Finally, the recognition effect and efficiency of LR-MKL are verified on the datasets Yale, ORL, LSVT, and Digit. Experimental results show that the proposed LR-MKL algorithm is an efficient kernel weights allocation method in MKL and boosts the performance of MKL largely.

Adaptive low-rank subspace learning with online optimization for robust visual tracking.

PubMed

Liu, Risheng; Wang, Di; Han, Yuzhuo; Fan, Xin; Luo, Zhongxuan

2017-04-01

In recent years, sparse and low-rank models have been widely used to formulate appearance subspace for visual tracking. However, most existing methods only consider the sparsity or low-rankness of the coefficients, which is not sufficient enough for appearance subspace learning on complex video sequences. Moreover, as both the low-rank and the column sparse measures are tightly related to all the samples in the sequences, it is challenging to incrementally solve optimization problems with both nuclear norm and column sparse norm on sequentially obtained video data. To address above limitations, this paper develops a novel low-rank subspace learning with adaptive penalization (LSAP) framework for subspace based robust visual tracking. Different from previous work, which often simply decomposes observations as low-rank features and sparse errors, LSAP simultaneously learns the subspace basis, low-rank coefficients and column sparse errors to formulate appearance subspace. Within LSAP framework, we introduce a Hadamard production based regularization to incorporate rich generative/discriminative structure constraints to adaptively penalize the coefficients for subspace learning. It is shown that such adaptive penalization can significantly improve the robustness of LSAP on severely corrupted dataset. To utilize LSAP for online visual tracking, we also develop an efficient incremental optimization scheme for nuclear norm and column sparse norm minimizations. Experiments on 50 challenging video sequences demonstrate that our tracker outperforms other state-of-the-art methods. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Process for converting coal into liquid fuel and metallurgical coke

DOEpatents

Wolfe, Richard A.; Im, Chang J.; Wright, Robert E.

1994-01-01

A method of recovering coal liquids and producing metallurgical coke utilizes low ash, low sulfur coal as a parent for a coal char formed by pyrolysis with a volatile content of less than 8%. The char is briquetted and heated in an inert gas over a prescribed heat history to yield a high strength briquette with less than 2% volatile content.

Self-Taught Low-Rank Coding for Visual Learning.

PubMed

Li, Sheng; Li, Kang; Fu, Yun

2018-03-01

The lack of labeled data presents a common challenge in many computer vision and machine learning tasks. Semisupervised learning and transfer learning methods have been developed to tackle this challenge by utilizing auxiliary samples from the same domain or from a different domain, respectively. Self-taught learning, which is a special type of transfer learning, has fewer restrictions on the choice of auxiliary data. It has shown promising performance in visual learning. However, existing self-taught learning methods usually ignore the structure information in data. In this paper, we focus on building a self-taught coding framework, which can effectively utilize the rich low-level pattern information abstracted from the auxiliary domain, in order to characterize the high-level structural information in the target domain. By leveraging a high quality dictionary learned across auxiliary and target domains, the proposed approach learns expressive codings for the samples in the target domain. Since many types of visual data have been proven to contain subspace structures, a low-rank constraint is introduced into the coding objective to better characterize the structure of the given target set. The proposed representation learning framework is called self-taught low-rank (S-Low) coding, which can be formulated as a nonconvex rank-minimization and dictionary learning problem. We devise an efficient majorization-minimization augmented Lagrange multiplier algorithm to solve it. Based on the proposed S-Low coding mechanism, both unsupervised and supervised visual learning algorithms are derived. Extensive experiments on five benchmark data sets demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.

Efficient l1 -norm-based low-rank matrix approximations for large-scale problems using alternating rectified gradient method.

PubMed

Kim, Eunwoo; Lee, Minsik; Choi, Chong-Ho; Kwak, Nojun; Oh, Songhwai

2015-02-01

Low-rank matrix approximation plays an important role in the area of computer vision and image processing. Most of the conventional low-rank matrix approximation methods are based on the l2 -norm (Frobenius norm) with principal component analysis (PCA) being the most popular among them. However, this can give a poor approximation for data contaminated by outliers (including missing data), because the l2 -norm exaggerates the negative effect of outliers. Recently, to overcome this problem, various methods based on the l1 -norm, such as robust PCA methods, have been proposed for low-rank matrix approximation. Despite the robustness of the methods, they require heavy computational effort and substantial memory for high-dimensional data, which is impractical for real-world problems. In this paper, we propose two efficient low-rank factorization methods based on the l1 -norm that find proper projection and coefficient matrices using the alternating rectified gradient method. The proposed methods are applied to a number of low-rank matrix approximation problems to demonstrate their efficiency and robustness. The experimental results show that our proposals are efficient in both execution time and reconstruction performance unlike other state-of-the-art methods.

Exploring empirical rank-frequency distributions longitudinally through a simple stochastic process.

PubMed

Finley, Benjamin J; Kilkki, Kalevi

2014-01-01

The frequent appearance of empirical rank-frequency laws, such as Zipf's law, in a wide range of domains reinforces the importance of understanding and modeling these laws and rank-frequency distributions in general. In this spirit, we utilize a simple stochastic cascade process to simulate several empirical rank-frequency distributions longitudinally. We focus especially on limiting the process's complexity to increase accessibility for non-experts in mathematics. The process provides a good fit for many empirical distributions because the stochastic multiplicative nature of the process leads to an often observed concave rank-frequency distribution (on a log-log scale) and the finiteness of the cascade replicates real-world finite size effects. Furthermore, we show that repeated trials of the process can roughly simulate the longitudinal variation of empirical ranks. However, we find that the empirical variation is often less that the average simulated process variation, likely due to longitudinal dependencies in the empirical datasets. Finally, we discuss the process limitations and practical applications.

Process for preparing a stabilized coal-water slurry

DOEpatents

Givens, E.N.; Kang, D.

1987-06-23

A process is described for preparing a stabilized coal particle suspension which includes the steps of providing an aqueous media substantially free of coal oxidizing constituents, reducing, in a nonoxidizing atmosphere, the particle size of the coal to be suspended to a size sufficiently small to permit suspension thereof in the aqueous media and admixing the coal of reduced particle size with the aqueous media to release into the aqueous media coal stabilizing constituents indigenous to and carried by the reduced coal particles in order to form a stabilized coal particle suspension. The coal stabilizing constituents are effective in a nonoxidizing atmosphere to maintain the coal particle suspension at essentially a neutral or alkaline pH. The coal is ground in a nonoxidizing atmosphere such as an inert gaseous atmosphere to reduce the coal to a sufficient particle size and is admixed with an aqueous media that has been purged of oxygen and acid-forming gases. 2 figs.

Process for preparing a stabilized coal-water slurry

DOEpatents

Givens, Edwin N.; Kang, Doohee

1987-01-01

A process for preparing a stabilized coal particle suspension which includes the steps of providing an aqueous media substantially free of coal oxidizing constituents, reducing, in a nonoxidizing atmosphere, the particle size of the coal to be suspended to a size sufficiently small to permit suspension thereof in the aqueous media and admixing the coal of reduced particle size with the aqueous media to release into the aqueous media coal stabilizing constituents indigenous to and carried by the reduced coal particles in order to form a stabilized coal particle suspension. The coal stabilizing constituents are effective in a nonoxidizing atmosphere to maintain the coal particle suspension at essentially a neutral or alkaline pH. The coal is ground in a nonoxidizing atmosphere such as an inert gaseous atmosphere to reduce the coal to a sufficient particle size and is admixed with an aqueous media that has been purged of oxygen and acid-forming gases.

Interfacial properties and coal cleaning in the LICADO process

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chi, S.M.B.

1986-01-01

The LICADO LIquid CArbon DiOxide process is currently being investigated as a new technique for cleaning coal. It relies on the relative wettability of clean coal and mineral particles between liquid CO/sub 2/ and water so that when liquid CO/sub 2/ is dispersed into a coal-water slurry, it tends to form agglomerates with the clean coal particles and float them to the liquid CO/sub 2/ phase. The mineral particles, on the other hand, remain in the aqueous phase as refuse. Since the surface/interfacial properties of fine coal particles play such an important role in this coal cleaning operation, an understandingmore » of their behavior becomes indispensable. In order to understand the separation mechanisms involved in the LICADO process, it is necessary to study the interfacial interactions occurring in the CO/sub 2/-water-coal system. It is believed that a relationship between the process performance and the wetting characteristics of the coal/refuse particles can be established. Upper Freeport -200 mesh coal from Indiana County, PA with 23.5% ash content was selected for the experimental work. A specially designed high pressure experimental unit, equipped with necessary optical and photographic accessories, was constructed for this study. Contact angles were also measured on the coal surface under two different sample pretreatment conditions: water-first-wet and liquid CO/sub 2/-first-wet. The results infer that an optimum mixing is necessary to provide sufficient shear force to expose the clean coal particles to the CO/sub 2/ droplets. The coal maceral and mineral association on the coal particle surface was determined based on the reflective grey level distinction between the mineral and Litho-type of various coal components.« less

Abundance and modes of occurrence of mercury in some low-sulfur coals from China

USGS Publications Warehouse

Zheng, Lingyun; Liu, Gaisheng; Chou, C.-L.

2008-01-01

Mercury (Hg) is one of the hazardous trace elements in coal. Mercury in coal is almost totally emitted into the atmosphere during coal combustion. Especially for utilities burning low-sulfur coals that do not require scrubbers, Hg reduction will be neglected. Hg abundances of 52 low-sulfur coal samples from different coalfields in six provinces of China were determined by a flow injection mercury system (FIMS). The results show that Hg abundances in selected low-sulfur coals range from 0.03??ppm to 0.79??ppm, with an arithmetic mean of 0.24??ppm, which is higher than that of average Chinese coals (0.19??ppm). Correlation analysis and sequential extraction procedures are performed to study possible modes of occurrence of Hg in low-sulfur coals. Modes of occurrence of Hg are variable in low-sulfur coals, and the sulfide-bound and organic-bound Hg may be the dominant forms. In addition, the silicate-bound Hg may be the main form in some of these coals because of magmatic intrusion. ?? 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

30 CFR 77.313 - Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 30 Mineral Resources 1 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators. 77.313 Section 77.313 Mineral Resources MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR COAL MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH MANDATORY SAFETY STANDARDS, SURFACE COAL MINES AND SURFACE WORK AREAS OF UNDERGROUND...

30 CFR 77.313 - Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 30 Mineral Resources 1 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators. 77.313 Section 77.313 Mineral Resources MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR COAL MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH MANDATORY SAFETY STANDARDS, SURFACE COAL MINES AND SURFACE WORK AREAS OF UNDERGROUND...

30 CFR 77.313 - Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... 30 Mineral Resources 1 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators. 77.313 Section 77.313 Mineral Resources MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR COAL MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH MANDATORY SAFETY STANDARDS, SURFACE COAL MINES AND SURFACE WORK AREAS OF UNDERGROUND...

30 CFR 77.313 - Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 30 Mineral Resources 1 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators. 77.313 Section 77.313 Mineral Resources MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR COAL MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH MANDATORY SAFETY STANDARDS, SURFACE COAL MINES AND SURFACE WORK AREAS OF UNDERGROUND...

30 CFR 77.313 - Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... 30 Mineral Resources 1 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false Wet-coal feedbins; low-level indicators. 77.313 Section 77.313 Mineral Resources MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR COAL MINE SAFETY AND HEALTH MANDATORY SAFETY STANDARDS, SURFACE COAL MINES AND SURFACE WORK AREAS OF UNDERGROUND...

Cross-cultural differences in processing of architectural ranking: evidence from an event-related potential study.

PubMed

Mecklinger, Axel; Kriukova, Olga; Mühlmann, Heiner; Grunwald, Thomas

2014-01-01

Visual object identification is modulated by perceptual experience. In a cross-cultural ERP study we investigated whether cultural expertise determines how buildings that vary in their ranking between high and low according to the Western architectural decorum are perceived. Two groups of German and Chinese participants performed an object classification task in which high- and low-ranking Western buildings had to be discriminated from everyday life objects. ERP results indicate that an early stage of visual object identification (i.e., object model selection) is facilitated for high-ranking buildings for the German participants, only. At a later stage of object identification, in which object knowledge is complemented by information from semantic and episodic long-term memory, no ERP evidence for cultural differences was obtained. These results suggest that the identification of architectural ranking is modulated by culturally specific expertise with Western-style architecture already at an early processing stage.

Catalytic coal hydroliquefaction process

DOEpatents

Garg, Diwakar

1984-01-01

A process is described for the liquefaction of coal in a hydrogen donor solvent in the presence of hydrogen and a co-catalyst combination of iron and a Group VI or Group VIII non-ferrous metal or compounds of the catalysts.

Geochemistry of vanadium (V) in Chinese coals.

PubMed

Liu, Yuan; Liu, Guijian; Qu, Qinyuan; Qi, Cuicui; Sun, Ruoyu; Liu, Houqi

2017-10-01

Vanadium in coals may have potential environmental and economic impacts. However, comprehensive knowledge of the geochemistry of V in coals is lacking. In this study, abundances, distribution and modes of occurrence of V are reviewed by compiling >2900 reported Chinese coal samples. With coal reserves in individual provinces as the weighting factors, V in Chinese coals is estimated to have an average abundance of 35.81 μg/g. Large variation of V concentration is observed in Chinese coals of different regions, coal-forming periods, and maturation ranks. According to the concentration coefficient of V in coals from individual provinces, three regions are divided across Chinese coal deposits. Vanadium in Chinese coals is probably influenced by sediment source and sedimentary environment, supplemented by late-stage hydrothermal fluids. Specifically, hydrothermal fluids have relatively more significant effect on the enrichment of V in local coal seams. Vanadium in coals is commonly associated with aluminosilicate minerals and organic matter, and the modes of V occurrence in coal depend on coal-forming environment and coal rank. The Chinese V emission inventory during coal combustion is estimated to be 4906 mt in 2014, accounting for 50.55 % of global emission. Vanadium emissions by electric power plants are the largest contributor.

[Predicting low NOx combustion property of a coal-fired boiler].

PubMed

Zhou, Hao; Mao, Jianbo; Chi, Zuohe; Jiang, Xiao; Wang, Zhenhua; Cen, Kefa

2002-03-01

More attention was paid to the low NOx combustion property of the high capacity tangential firing boiler, but the NOx emission and unburned carbon content in fly ash of coal burned boiler were complicated, they were affected by many factors, such as coal character, boiler's load, air distribution, boiler style, burner style, furnace temperature, excess air ratio, pulverized coal fineness and the uniformity of the air and coal distribution, etc. In this paper, the NOx emission property and unburned carbon content in fly ash of a 600 MW utility tangentially firing coal burned boiler was experimentally investigated, and taking advantage of the nonlinear dynamics characteristics and self-learning characteristics of artificial neural network, an artificial neural network model on low NOx combustion property of the high capacity boiler was developed and verified. The results illustrated that such a model can predicate the NOx emission concentration and unburned carbon content under various operating conditions, if combined with the optimization algorithm, the operator can find the best operation condition of the low NOx combustion.

Removal of mercury from coal via a microbial pretreatment process

DOEpatents

Borole, Abhijeet P [Knoxville, TN; Hamilton, Choo Y [Knoxville, TN

2011-08-16

A process for the removal of mercury from coal prior to combustion is disclosed. The process is based on use of microorganisms to oxidize iron, sulfur and other species binding mercury within the coal, followed by volatilization of mercury by the microorganisms. The microorganisms are from a class of iron and/or sulfur oxidizing bacteria. The process involves contacting coal with the bacteria in a batch or continuous manner. The mercury is first solubilized from the coal, followed by microbial reduction to elemental mercury, which is stripped off by sparging gas and captured by a mercury recovery unit, giving mercury-free coal. The mercury can be recovered in pure form from the sorbents via additional processing.

Integrated report on the toxicological mitigation of coal liquids by hydrotreatment and other processes. [Petroleum and coal-derived products

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Guerin, M.R.; Griest, W.H.; Ho, C.H.

1986-06-01

Research here on the toxicological properties of coal-derived liquids focuses on characterizing the refining process and refined products. Principle attention is given to the potential tumorigenicity of coal-derived fuels and to the identification of means to further reduce tumorigenicity should this be found necessary. Hydrotreatment is studied most extensively because it will be almost certainly required to produce commercial products and because it is likely to also greatly reduce tumorigenic activity relative to that of crude coal-liquid feedstocks. This report presents the results of a lifetime C3H mouse skin tumorigenicity assay of an H-Coal series of oils and considers themore » relationships between tumorigenicity, chemistry, and processing. Lifetime assay results are reported for an H-Coal syncrude mode light oil/heavy oil blend, a low severity hydrotreatment product, a high severity hydrotreatment product, a naphtha reformate, a heating oil, a petroleum-derived reformate, and a petroleum derived heating oil. Data are compared with those for an earlier study of an SRC-II blend and products of its hydrotreatment. Adequate data are presented to allow an independent qualitative assessment of the conclusions while statistical evaluation of the data is being completed. The report also documents the physical and chemical properties of the oils tested. 33 refs., 14 figs., 53 tabs.« less

Exploring Empirical Rank-Frequency Distributions Longitudinally through a Simple Stochastic Process

PubMed Central

Finley, Benjamin J.; Kilkki, Kalevi

2014-01-01

The frequent appearance of empirical rank-frequency laws, such as Zipf’s law, in a wide range of domains reinforces the importance of understanding and modeling these laws and rank-frequency distributions in general. In this spirit, we utilize a simple stochastic cascade process to simulate several empirical rank-frequency distributions longitudinally. We focus especially on limiting the process’s complexity to increase accessibility for non-experts in mathematics. The process provides a good fit for many empirical distributions because the stochastic multiplicative nature of the process leads to an often observed concave rank-frequency distribution (on a log-log scale) and the finiteness of the cascade replicates real-world finite size effects. Furthermore, we show that repeated trials of the process can roughly simulate the longitudinal variation of empirical ranks. However, we find that the empirical variation is often less that the average simulated process variation, likely due to longitudinal dependencies in the empirical datasets. Finally, we discuss the process limitations and practical applications. PMID:24755621

Coals of Hungary

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Landis, E.R.; Rohrbacher, T.J.; Gluskoter, H.

1999-07-01

As part of the activities conducted under the U.S. Hungarian Science and Technology Fund, a total of 39 samples from five coal mines in Hungary were selected for standard coal analyses and major, minor and trace elements analysis. The mine areas sampled were selected to provide a spectrum of coal quality information for comparison with other coal areas in central Europe and worldwide. All of the areas are of major importance in the energy budget of Hungary. The five sample sites contain coal in rocks of Jurassic, Cretaceous, Eocene, Miocene, and Pliocene age. The coals, from four underground and onemore » surface mine, range in rank from high volatile bituminous to lignite B. Most of the coal produced from the mines sampled is used to generate electricity. Some of the power plants that utilize the coals also provide heat for domestic and process usage. The standard coal analysis program is based on tests performed in accordance with standards of the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM). Proximate and ultimate analyses were supplemented by determinations of the heating value, equilibrium moisture, forms of sulfur, free-swelling index, ash fusion temperatures (both reducing and oxidizing), apparent specific gravity and Hardgrove Grindability index. The major, minor and trace element analyses were performed in accordance with standardized procedures of the U.S. Geological Survey. The analytical results will be available in the International Coal Quality Data Base of the USGS. The results of the program provide data for comparison with test data from Europe and information of value to potential investors or cooperators in the coal industry of Hungary and Central Europe.« less

Preparation and gasification of a Thailand coal-water fuel

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ness, R.O. Jr.; Anderson, C.M.; Musich, M.A.

In response to an inquiry by the Department of Mineral Resources (DMR) in Thailand, the Energy and Environmental Research Center (EERC) prepared a four-task program to assess the responsiveness of Wiang Haeng coal to the temperature and pressure conditions of hot-water drying (HWD). The results indicate that HWD made several improvements in the coal, notably increases in heating value and carbon content and reductions in equilibrium moisture and oxygen content. The equilibrium moisture content decreased from 37.4 wt% for the raw coal to about 20 wt% for the HWD coals. The energy density, determined at 500 cP, indicates an increasemore » from 4450 to 6650 Btu/lb by hydrothermal treatment. Raw and HWD coal were then gasified at various mild gasification conditions of 700 C and 30 psig. The tests indicated that the coal is probably similar to other low-rank coals and will produce high levels of hydrogen and be fairly reactive.« less

Fluidized coal combustion

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moynihan, P. I.; Young, D. L.

1979-01-01

Fluidized-bed coal combustion process, in which pulverized coal and limestone are burned in presence of forced air, may lead to efficient, reliable boilers with low sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide emissions.

Oxidation and carbonisation of coals: a case study of coal fire affected coals from the Wuda coalfield, Inner Mongolia, China

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kus, Jolanta; Meyer, Uwe; Ma, Jianwei; Chen-Brauchler, Dai

2010-05-01

At the coalfield of Wuda (Inner Mongolia, PR China) extensive underground coal fires cause widespread thermal and oxidative effects in coal seams. Within phase B of the Coal Fire Research Project of the Sino-German Initiative, methods for innovative fire-extinguishing technologies were investigated in multifaceted research approaches. Extensive investigations of oxidative and thermally affected coal seams in coal fire zone 18 were conducted in 2008 prior to application of new fire-extinguishing methods. We present results from the outcrop of coal seam No. 4 in the fire zone 18. The coal of seam No. 4 is of Early Permian age and belongs stratigraphically to the Shanxi Formation. The unaffected coal displays a high volatile bituminous A rank with a background value of random vitrinite reflectance ranging from 0.90 to 0.96 % Rr. Coal channel samples were coallected at actively extracted coal faces along multiple profiles with surface temperatures ranging from about 50° to 600°C. Microscopic examinations revealed a variety of products of coal exposure to the fire. Within coal samples, a marked rise in vitrinite reflectance from background values to 5.55% Rr (6.00 % Rmax) is encountered. In addition, a number of coal samples showed suppressed vitrinite reflectances ranging between 0.82 to 0.88% Rr. Further, seemingly heat unaffected coal samples display intensive development of oxidations rims at coal grain edges and cracks as well as shrinkage cracks and formation of iron oxides/hydroxides. Instead, thermally affected coal samples with higher coalification grade are further characterised by development of macropores (devolatilisation pores) in vitrinitic streaks, transformation of liptinite to meta-liptinite and micrinite as well as by natural coke particles of mostly porous nature and fine to coarse grained anisotropic mosaic. Coal petrographic investigations confirmed a hypothesis that both, oxidations as well as low temperature carbonisation govern the thermal

Recovery of Rare Earth Elements from Coal and Coal Byproducts via a Closed Loop Leaching Process: Final Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Peterson, Richard; Heinrichs, Michael; Argumedo, Darwin

Objectives: Through this grant, Battelle proposes to address Area of Interest (AOI) 1 to develop a bench-scale technology to economically separate, extract, and concentrate mixed REEs from coal ash. U.S. coal and coal byproducts provide the opportunity for a domestic source of REEs. The DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) has characterized various coal and coal byproducts samples and has found varying concentrations of REE ranging up to 1,000 parts per million by weight. The primary project objective is to validate the economic viability of recovering REEs from the coal byproduct coal ash using Battelle’s patented closed-loop Acid Digestion Processmore » (ADP). This will be accomplished by selecting coal sources with the potential to provide REE concentrations above 300 parts per million by weight, collecting characterization data for coal ash samples generated via three different methods, and performing a Techno-Economic Analysis (TEA) for the proposed process. The regional availability of REE-laden coal ash, the regional market for rare earth concentrates, and the system capital and operating costs for rare earth recovery using the ADP technology will be accounted for in the TEA. Limited laboratory testing will be conducted to generate the parameters needed for the design of a bench scale system for REE recovery. The ultimate project outcome will be the design for an optimized, closed loop process to economically recovery REEs such that the process may be demonstrated at the bench scale in a Phase 2 project. Project Description: The project will encompass evaluation of the ADP technology for the economic recovery of REEs from coal and coal ash. The ADP was originally designed and demonstrated for the U.S. Army to facilitate demilitarization of cast-cured munitions via acid digestion in a closed-loop process. Proof of concept testing has been conducted on a sample of Ohio-based Middle Kittanning coal and has demonstrated the feasibility of

Combined compressed air storage-low BTU coal gasification power plant

DOEpatents

Kartsounes, George T.; Sather, Norman F.

1979-01-01

An electrical generating power plant includes a Compressed Air Energy Storage System (CAES) fueled with low BTU coal gas generated in a continuously operating high pressure coal gasifier system. This system is used in coordination with a continuously operating main power generating plant to store excess power generated during off-peak hours from the power generating plant, and to return the stored energy as peak power to the power generating plant when needed. The excess coal gas which is produced by the coal gasifier during off-peak hours is stored in a coal gas reservoir. During peak hours the stored coal gas is combined with the output of the coal gasifier to fuel the gas turbines and ultimately supply electrical power to the base power plant.

Energy Conversion Alternatives Study (ECAS), Westinghouse phase 1. Volume 3: Combustors, furnaces and low-BTU gasifiers. [used in coal gasification and coal liquefaction (equipment specifications)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hamm, J. R.

1976-01-01

Information is presented on the design, performance, operating characteristics, cost, and development status of coal preparation equipment, combustion equipment, furnaces, low-Btu gasification processes, low-temperature carbonization processes, desulfurization processes, and pollution particulate removal equipment. The information was compiled for use by the various cycle concept leaders in determining the performance, capital costs, energy costs, and natural resource requirements of each of their system configurations.

Solvent recyclability in a multistep direct liquefaction process

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hetland, M.D.; Rindt, J.R.

1995-12-31

Direct liquefaction research at the Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC) has, for a number of years, concentrated on developing a direct liquefaction process specifically for low-rank coals (LRCs) through the use of hydrogen-donating solvents and solvents similar to coal-derived liquids, the water/gas shift reaction, and lower-severity reaction conditions. The underlying assumption of all of the research was that advantage could be taken of the reactivity and specific qualities of LRCs to produce a tetrahydrofuran (THF)-soluble material that might be easier to upgrade than the soluble residuum produced during direct liquefaction of high-rank coals. A multistep approach was taken tomore » produce the THF-soluble material, consisting of (1) preconversion treatment to prepare the coal for solubilization, (2) solubilization of the coal in the solvent, and (3) polishing to complete solubilization of the remaining material. The product of these three steps can then be upgraded during a traditional hydrotreatment step. The results of the EERC`s research indicated that additional studies to develop this process more fully were justified. Two areas were targeted for further research: (1) determination of the recyclability of the solvent used during solubilization and (2) determination of the minimum severity required for hydrotreatment of the liquid product. The current project was funded to investigate these two areas.« less

A comparative study on pyrolysis characteristic Indonesia biomassa and low grade coal

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Adhityatama, G. I.; Hanif, F.; Cahyono, R. B.; Hidayat, M.; Akiyama, T.

2017-05-01

A comparative study on pyrolysis of biomass and low grade coal was conducted using a thermogravimetric analyzer. Each kind of biomass and coal has a characteristic pyrolysis behavior which is explained based on its individual component characteristics. All fuels experienced a small weight loss as temperatures approached 450K because of moisture evaporation. The coal had smallest total weight loss compared to biomass due to its high content of fixed carbon, suggesting that coal would produce high amounts of char and small amounts of volatile matter (e.g., tar and gas). The biomass exhibits similar tendency regarding the decomposition process which is the hemicelluloses break down first at temperatures of 470 to 530K, cellulose follows in the temperature range 510 to 620K, and lignin is the last component to pyrolyzer at temperatures of 550 to 770K. The thermal decomposition of biomass consisted of two predominant peaks corresponding first to the decomposition of cellulose and, second, to the decomposition of lignin. Meanwhile, the coal exhibited only single peak because these fuels were predominantly composed of carbon. Based on the kinetic analysis, coal have the smaller activation energy (55.32kJ/mol) compared to biomass (range from 89.80-172.86 kJ/mol). Pyrolysis process also created more pore material in the solid product. These results were important for the optimization of energy conversion from those solid fuels. Biomass resulted lower solid product and higher tar product, thus would be suitable for liquid and gas energy production.

A Novel Multi-Sensor Environmental Perception Method Using Low-Rank Representation and a Particle Filter for Vehicle Reversing Safety

PubMed Central

Zhang, Zutao; Li, Yanjun; Wang, Fubing; Meng, Guanjun; Salman, Waleed; Saleem, Layth; Zhang, Xiaoliang; Wang, Chunbai; Hu, Guangdi; Liu, Yugang

2016-01-01

Environmental perception and information processing are two key steps of active safety for vehicle reversing. Single-sensor environmental perception cannot meet the need for vehicle reversing safety due to its low reliability. In this paper, we present a novel multi-sensor environmental perception method using low-rank representation and a particle filter for vehicle reversing safety. The proposed system consists of four main steps, namely multi-sensor environmental perception, information fusion, target recognition and tracking using low-rank representation and a particle filter, and vehicle reversing speed control modules. First of all, the multi-sensor environmental perception module, based on a binocular-camera system and ultrasonic range finders, obtains the distance data for obstacles behind the vehicle when the vehicle is reversing. Secondly, the information fusion algorithm using an adaptive Kalman filter is used to process the data obtained with the multi-sensor environmental perception module, which greatly improves the robustness of the sensors. Then the framework of a particle filter and low-rank representation is used to track the main obstacles. The low-rank representation is used to optimize an objective particle template that has the smallest L-1 norm. Finally, the electronic throttle opening and automatic braking is under control of the proposed vehicle reversing control strategy prior to any potential collisions, making the reversing control safer and more reliable. The final system simulation and practical testing results demonstrate the validity of the proposed multi-sensor environmental perception method using low-rank representation and a particle filter for vehicle reversing safety. PMID:27294931

A Novel Multi-Sensor Environmental Perception Method Using Low-Rank Representation and a Particle Filter for Vehicle Reversing Safety.

PubMed

Zhang, Zutao; Li, Yanjun; Wang, Fubing; Meng, Guanjun; Salman, Waleed; Saleem, Layth; Zhang, Xiaoliang; Wang, Chunbai; Hu, Guangdi; Liu, Yugang

2016-06-09

Environmental perception and information processing are two key steps of active safety for vehicle reversing. Single-sensor environmental perception cannot meet the need for vehicle reversing safety due to its low reliability. In this paper, we present a novel multi-sensor environmental perception method using low-rank representation and a particle filter for vehicle reversing safety. The proposed system consists of four main steps, namely multi-sensor environmental perception, information fusion, target recognition and tracking using low-rank representation and a particle filter, and vehicle reversing speed control modules. First of all, the multi-sensor environmental perception module, based on a binocular-camera system and ultrasonic range finders, obtains the distance data for obstacles behind the vehicle when the vehicle is reversing. Secondly, the information fusion algorithm using an adaptive Kalman filter is used to process the data obtained with the multi-sensor environmental perception module, which greatly improves the robustness of the sensors. Then the framework of a particle filter and low-rank representation is used to track the main obstacles. The low-rank representation is used to optimize an objective particle template that has the smallest L-1 norm. Finally, the electronic throttle opening and automatic braking is under control of the proposed vehicle reversing control strategy prior to any potential collisions, making the reversing control safer and more reliable. The final system simulation and practical testing results demonstrate the validity of the proposed multi-sensor environmental perception method using low-rank representation and a particle filter for vehicle reversing safety.

Learning Low-Rank Decomposition for Pan-Sharpening With Spatial-Spectral Offsets.

PubMed

Yang, Shuyuan; Zhang, Kai; Wang, Min

2017-08-25

Finding accurate injection components is the key issue in pan-sharpening methods. In this paper, a low-rank pan-sharpening (LRP) model is developed from a new perspective of offset learning. Two offsets are defined to represent the spatial and spectral differences between low-resolution multispectral and high-resolution multispectral (HRMS) images, respectively. In order to reduce spatial and spectral distortions, spatial equalization and spectral proportion constraints are designed and cast on the offsets, to develop a spatial and spectral constrained stable low-rank decomposition algorithm via augmented Lagrange multiplier. By fine modeling and heuristic learning, our method can simultaneously reduce spatial and spectral distortions in the fused HRMS images. Moreover, our method can efficiently deal with noises and outliers in source images, for exploring low-rank and sparse characteristics of data. Extensive experiments are taken on several image data sets, and the results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed LRP.

Application studies of RFID technology in the process of coal logistics transport

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qiao, Bingqin; Chang, Xiaoming; Hao, Meiyan; Kong, Dejin

2012-04-01

For quality control problems in coal transport, RFID technology has been proposed to be applied to coal transportation process. The whole process RFID traceability system from coal production to consumption has been designed and coal supply chain logistics tracking system integration platform has been built, to form the coal supply chain traceability and transport tracking system and providing more and more transparent tracking and monitoring of coal quality information for consumers of coal. Currently direct transport and combined transport are the main forms of coal transportation in China. The means of transport are cars, trains and ships. In the booming networking environment of RFID technology, the RFID technology will be applied to coal logistics and provide opportunity for the coal transportation tracking in the process transportation.

Laser Induced Hydrogen Generation from Coal in Water

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seyitliyev, Dovletgeldi; Kholikov, Khomidkhodzha; Er, Ali

We report an alternative way of obtaining hydrogen using nanosecond laser pulses and various ranks of coal and coke. SEM-EDS analysis shows the atomic concentrations of elements on each of the powders which also is in good agreement with calorimeter analysis. Coal and coke powders were irradiated with 1064nm IR and 532 nm green Nd:YAG pulsed laser beam for 45 minutes. The volume of the total gas generated after irradiation of each rank was measured using the water displacement method. The amount of gas generated increased when using 532 nm compared to 1064 nm. Post-irradiation SEM images show structural differences with samples before irradiation. The amount of gas generation with respect to laser energy density shows nonlinear correlation. Generated gas concentrations were then analyzed using gas chromatography (GC). Hydrogen and carbon monoxide were the two most highly generated gases, and the efficiency of each rank of coal was determined by analyzing the hydrogen to carbon monoxide ratio. The highest efficiency rank was anthracite, with hydrogen to carbon monoxide ratio of 1.4. GC analysis also showed that the maximum hydrogen generation occurs at 100 mJ/pulse laser energy. The efficiency of each rank of coal was observed to correlate with carbon content. American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund.

IDENTIFICATION AND EMISSION RATES OF MOLECULAR TRACERS IN COAL SMOKE PARTICULATE MATTER. (R823990)

EPA Science Inventory

The abundances and distributions of organic constituents in coal smoke particulate matter are dependent on thermal combustion temperature, ventilation, burn time, and coal rank (geologic maturity). Important coal rank indicators from smoke include (1) the decreases in CPIs of ...