COAL CONVERSION

Coal is known as a fossil fuel because it is composed of the remains of trees and other plants that lived hundreds of millions of years ago. Oil and natural gas are also fossil fuels. All are available in America. But coal is, by far, the most plentiful of the three.

Coal has long been used as a fuel for electric power plants. Many years ago, coal was a popular fuel for heating homes. But coal is not as convenient a fuel as oil or natural gas. The furnaces needed to burn coal are more complicated. And special equipment is needed to control air-pollution in industry. For these reasons, scientists are searching for prac- tical ways to convert coal into liquid fuel and gas.

Liquid fuel made from coal could be used in place of heating oil. It could also be made into gasoline for cars and kerosene for jet planes. Gas produced from coal could be mixed with natural gas for home heating and industrial use.

EXPERIMENT 6

Part A. Getting Methane from Coal

THINGS YOU NEED: Lump of soft (bituminous) coal about the size of a baseball. A two-pound coffee can. Funnel. Small glass bottle such as spices come in.

Fuel gas has been produced from coal for decades. The process requires high temperatures because chemical bonds must be broken to form the gas. (Part B of this experiment illustrates that process.)

But coal also contains a small amount of burnable gas trapped within its pores and cavities. This gas is not chemically linked in the coal and can be released rather easily.