New Plan for Coal Deep Processing

On March 3, the National Energy Administration of China (NEA) released the 13th Five-Year Plan for Coal Deep Processing Industry (2016-2020). It specifies that, by 2020, China’s coal-to-liquids (CTL) capacity is to reach 13 million t/a, synthetic natural gas (SNG) capacity is to reach 17 billion cubic meter/a, and capacity for quality-based utilization of low-rank coal is to reach 15 million t/a. “Coal deep processing”does not include the manufacture of traditional coal chemicals.
China’s coal deep processing industry has developed rapidly since 2011. At the end of 2015, CTL capacity was 2.54 million t/a, that of SNG was 3.1 billion cubic meter/a, and that of coal to olefins (including methanol to olefin) was 8.62 million t/a. Also, for the same year, domestic output of the three kinds of products reached 1.15 million tons, 1.88 billion cubic meters and 6.48 million tons, respectively.
Key targets are as follows:

Coal-to-liquids (CTL)

Shenhua Ordos Coal Liquefaction Corporation has put a 1.08 million t/a direct coal liquefaction unit into operation. On the basis of experience with that unit, industry players are to improve direct coal liquefaction technologies continually and kick off more new projects. Further, they are to produce super clean gasoline&diesel, and specialty oil products such as military diesel fuel, high-density jet fuel and rocket kerosene. Liquefaction residuals will be utilized more efficiently; naphtha and liquefied petroleum gas will be utilized to make arene and propylene.
Sound operation of production is to be ensured, as in a million ton-grade indirect coal liquefaction (ICL) plant of Yankuang Group and a 4 million t/a ICL plant of Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group Co., Ltd.
Gasification efficiency will be improved.both operating costs and waste water discharge will be reduced by means of R&D on entrained-flow units with a daily processing capacity of 3 000-4 000 tons.
Product structure is to be optimized by relying on low and high-temperature Fischer-Tropsch synthesis technologies. More high-value-added products are to be manufactured, including super clean gasoline, high-quality paraffin, solvent oil, a-olefins and high-end lubricating oil. In addition, new Fischer-Tropsch synthesis catalysts will be developed.

Synthetic natural gas (SNG)

Existing SNG projects will be improved for continuous, stable and clean production. R&D is to pursue eco-friendly fixed-bed slag gasification technologies.And gasifier demonstration projects boasting processing capacity of 1 500-2 000 t/d are to be constructed. More efforts will be made to combine fixed-bed and entrained-flow gasification technologies, and to research technologies for methanation, efficient recycling of phenol ammonia, and biochemical treatment of phenolic wastewater and high-salt water processing. Furthermore, fractionation-conversion fluidized bed gasification and catalytic gasification technologies are to be improved to greatly boost the proportion of methane in syngas.

Quality-based utilization of low-rank coal

The plan calls for studying pyrolytic techniques for low-rank coal, and new technologies for flash pyrolysis, catalytic pyrolysis, pressurized pyrolysis and hydropyrolys is of higher-quality oil products. Technologies integrating “pyrolysis and gasification” or “pyrolysis and burning” will be developed. Breakthroughs are likely to be made in pyrolysis and gas-liquid-solid separation of pulverized coal. New projects will pursue electricity cogeneration from coal tar by means of gas turbines with medium orlow heat value, or upgraded coal-fired boilers.
Further, coal tar R&D will pursue quality-divided conversion technologies, i.e. using light components to make arene, using middle components to make high-quality aviation kerosene & diesel, and using heavy components to make specialty oil products.Technologies to extract fine chemicals like pyridine and carbazole from medium- and low-temperature coal tar will also be a research emphasis, as these fine chemicals are difficult to derive from petroleum. Demonstration projects of 500 000t/a scale are to be constructed for producing arene and naphthenic oil by whole-fraction hydrogenation of medium- and low-temperature coal tar.

Coal chemicals

Technologies formethanol-to-aromatics, methanol-to-olefins, catalysts and reactor sare to be improved with the help of million-ton-scale demonstration projects. New techniques for coal-based ethylene glycol are required for better product performance. Other research focuses include non-metal catalysts, larger-scale reactors and the production of high-carbon primary alcohol, olefin and ethanol from syngas.

Comprehensive utilization of coal and oil

Integrating oil refining technologies with coal gasification, Fischer-Tropsch synthesis and coal-oil co-process technologies are another R&D area. Hydrogen production systems relying on coal gasification are to be adopted to offset the consumption of natural gas. Fischer-Tropsch synthesis units are to be constructed to provide super clean oil products with by-product normal-paraffin-containing naphtha, which will be used as raw materials for ethylene cracking. Refineries will be equipped with coal/oil co-processing units, manufacturing super clean oil products, and by-product high-aromatic latent naphtha will be used as a reformed material. Low-quality petroleum coke, residual oil and liquefaction residuals from coal/oil co-processing units will be gasified to supplement syngas. Further, players will conduct industrial demonstration projects pertaining to suspended bed and slurry-bed hydrogenation technologies.