Patent ID: 6911058

Claim:
A method for producing clean energy from coal comprising: feeding coal into a chamber which is sealed to the atmosphere and which possesses a charging end and a discharging end; moving the coal within said chamber towards the discharging end; injecting oxygen which is essentially pure in such a way as to combust a portion of the coal while maintaining a pressurized reducing atmosphere to: (i) cause the release of thermal energy to devolatilize the coal; and (ii) yield a pressurized hydrogen rich raw gas containing coal-derived cancer causing distillates and hydrocarbons together with a hot char; cracking the coal-derived cancer causing distillates and hydrocarbons contained in the hydrogen rich raw gas to make a hydrogen rich cracked gas which after desulfurization becomes a clean hydrogen rich synthesis gas; directing the hot char to a gasifier which is sealed to the atmosphere; gasifying the hot char with an oxidant in said gasifier to yield a raw second gas and a molten slag; flowing the raw second gas together with the molten slag through a common port out of said gasifier to maintain said port open for the free flow of the raw second gas and the molten slag; separating the raw second gas from the molten slag after exiting from said common port; directing the raw second gas to a cleanup system to clean it and thus yield a clean second gas; and quenching the molten slag to convert it to a non-leaching solid.