Methanol production system combining HTGR with coal gasification plant

This paper describes a nuclear heat application system of the HTGR that is combined with a coal gasification and a H2 production subsystem to produce methanol from coal. In order to convert coal to methanol completely without emitting CO2 and without having residual carbon in the refining process, we need to add hydrogen to raw gas for methanol synthesis. In this report, two methanol production systems are proposed and they are examined and evaluated on several aspects, such as economy, environment, effective usage of coal and nuclear energy, operation flexibility and require technology development. (J.P.N.)