dissident wrote:Subjectivist wrote:Typical coal has a ratio of 0.5:1 hydrogen to carbon or 1:2 which ever way you prefer to state it. Being one third Hydrogen by number of hydrogen and two thirds carbon is not what I would call "little or no hydrogen"
Do you know what syngas is? When the discussion is about H2 from coal it is from the following reaction
C + O2 + H2O --> H2 + CO2 (via a step involving CO formation).
The hydrogen in coal is a total sideshow even if its 3.5% of it by weight for anthracite. You make it sound like coal hydrogen is a commercially relevant resource. It isn't.
First the vast majority of coal world wide is sub-bitumous or lignite, anthracite is only slghtly more common than natural graphite.
Secondly up until World War II in the USA the majority of Haber-Bosch fertilizer process plants used soft coal or lignite as their hydrogen source, not methane as is common today, nor electrolysis sourced as was done in Norway.
Just because we do not do it that way any longer does not mean it is irrelevent.