A COMPETITOR FOR GASOLINE

Once you build refineries to process coal, say Drs. W.D. Harris and R.R. Davison of Texas A&M University, why take the detour to crude and then to gasoline, when you can get methanol (wood alcohol) from the coal directly?

Though its heating value is only about half that of gasoline (requiring larger fuel tanks for the same range of the car), its octane number is at least as high as that of premium gasoline, and due to its moisture content, it will yield more power per unit heating value even without increasing compression or displacement in present engines. Yet compression could easily be increased, for methanol pollutes less than gasoline. A test with a catalyst equiped Gremlin showed hydrocarbon emissions about the same, carbon monoxide about four times less, and nitrogen oxides, the biggest headache of pollution control, down by a factor of more than 20. Moreover, there is no lead or sulfur dioxide to make catalytic pollution control highly questionable as is the case with gasoline.

Drs. Harris and Davison estimate that about 200 gallons of methanol can be obtained from a ton of coal. Inspite of the high capital costs (about $300 million for a 100,000 b/d coal to methanol plant), large scale production could make methanol immediately competitive with gasoline, and its advantage would widen as the price of crude keeps going up.

Present car engines do not need drastic modifications to use methanol as a fuel, and US coal supplies suffice for many centuries.

(For further details, see Methanolfrom Coal, Oil & Gas J., 17 Dec. 1973; and Hydrogen and other synthetic fuels, Govt. Prtg. Off., Washington, D.C., September 1972.)