Industrial Chemistry and Process Technology

Coal gasification: one raw material, several genuinely different products

Coal gasification converts coal into synthesis gas (syngas), a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, rather than burning it outright. That syngas is a chemical building block, not a fuel by itself, and it can be processed further into a specific, testable set of downstream products: ethanol, via syngas fermentation or catalytic conversion routes, and ammonia-based fertilisers such as urea, via established syngas-to-ammonia chemistry.

What syngas cannot become is an explosive like nitroglycerine, which is manufactured through an entirely unrelated route, the nitration of glycerol. The distinction matters precisely because it is easy to lump "coal chemistry" and "industrial explosives" together as one undifferentiated category of dangerous industrial chemistry, when they are in fact separate chemical pathways starting from separate raw materials.

India runs a National Coal Gasification Mission, under the Ministry of Coal, targeting 100 million tonnes (MT) of coal gasification capacity by 2030. The strategic logic is import substitution: India imports roughly 83% of its oil, over 90% of its methanol and a meaningful share of its ammonia, so converting domestic coal into these same chemical feedstocks through gasification is intended to reduce that import bill and build a more self-reliant chemical and fertiliser economy, rather than being pursued as a coal-power or emissions initiative.

Plastic is far more common in everyday items than "plastic products" alone

A useful exam-tested habit is not assuming "plastic" only means the obvious moulded objects, bottles, bags, containers, since a range of everyday items are made from plastic without looking like conventional plastic at all. Cigarette filters (butts) are made of cellulose acetate, a form of plastic, and are consequently among the most littered plastic items worldwide, not merely paper and tobacco waste as they might appear. Many modern eyeglass lenses are made from plastic polymers such as polycarbonate rather than glass, prized for being lighter and more impact-resistant. And car tyres are made largely of synthetic rubber, a petroleum-derived polymer that is itself classified as plastic, making tyre wear a significant, easily overlooked source of microplastic pollution.

Quick revision points

• Coal gasification converts coal to syngas (CO + H2), which can be processed into ethanol and urea/ammonia-based fertiliser. It cannot produce nitroglycerine, which comes from nitration of glycerol, an unrelated chemical route.
• India's National Coal Gasification Mission (Ministry of Coal): target of 100 MT of coal gasification capacity by 2030, driven by import substitution for oil, methanol and ammonia, not by a power-generation or emissions goal.
• Plastic appears in items that do not look like conventional plastic: cigarette filters (cellulose acetate), many eyeglass lenses (polycarbonate), and car tyres (synthetic rubber, a petroleum-derived polymer), each a real and testable source of plastic and microplastic pollution.