Feasibility of Deep Underground Coal Gasification

Dwindling and uncertain supplies of oil and natural gas has called for drastic new alternative fuel sources to keep this energy driven world turning. Underground coal gasification (UCG) is just one of the alternative productions of energy, having great success in the creation of synthetic gas (syngas) with the reduction of green house gases.At the moment coal reserves are vast worldwide however only a sixth of the worlds deposits are economically viable to mine because of deep lying deposits and low quality coal. A new method of UCG is the gasification of deep coal seems ranging from 500 meters to 1500 meters. Problems associated with the mining of these reserves will be explored in this paper.Europe is a county with the majority of its coal deposits lying deep beneath the surface not viable to mine economically. For the last 30 years European governments and associated research groups have been exploring the possibility and development of extracting this coal through UCG pilot tests. To this present day there have only been three pilot tests with relation to operations of deep UCG located in France, Belgium and Spain.The aim of this thesis is an analytical review of the test results from the three European pilot sites, to build a picture of the complexities and problems associated with deep UCG needed to be overcome. Also to explore possible benefits and feasibility of deep UCG will also be addressed. Recent technologies and discoveries of alternative resources associated with hydrocarbon deposits have allowed the expansion of techniques developed by previous research to be exploited. Coal bed methane (CBM) is just one of these resources where by research and technology together with availability and economic recovery has commercially put itself on the map.