Prospect Of Enugu Nigeria Coal As A Source Of Chemicals
Steve Amujiogu
Department of Industrial Chemistry, Enugu State University of Science and Technology
Cyril Ogbuanu
Department of Industrial Chemistry, Enugu State University of Science and Technology
Michael Onyia
Department of Applied Microbiology and Brewing, Enugu State University of Science and Technology
Keywords: Coal, carbonization, coal tar, ammonicall liquor, ammonia
Abstract
The production and utilization of ammonia and other chemicals from coal can lead to the diversification of economic resource. This is aimed to develop a simple and economically viable method of generating, purification, qualitative and quantitative analysis of ammonia. . The evolved gas and steam from carbonization of 1.5 Kg of coal at 600°C were condensed. The ammonical liquor from coal tar was separated using separating funnel method. Ammonia was separated from ammonical liquor by decomposing with calcium hydroxide liberate ammonia from all ammonia salts present in the ammonicall liquor. The liquid ammonia obtained was purified by successively by distillation at two temperature ranges of 80-94°C and 76-90°C. Confirmed qualitatively by simple chemical tests and quantified volumetrically. The result obtained revealed that there are more ammonia in unclean (0.620 ± 0.043 g/dm3 (0.07%)) coal sample than on clean sample (0.305 ± 0.012g/dm3 (0.03%)) and the reject/ dirt (0.252 ± 0.005g/ dm3 (0.03%)). The qualitative confirmatory tests showed that the sample was ammonia and contain no sulphur and halogens as impurities. Despite the hitches experienced, the sample is ammonia and it is economically viable.