In recent years, gasification, pyrolysis, syngas processing and direct coal liquefaction have been key technologies for converting biomass to renewable products such as fuels, alcohols and biochemicals. Fluor has carefully developed specific knowledge and expertise in the field:

• Gasification is a process to convert low value carbonaceous materials by partial oxidation to a syngas containing predominantly carbon monoxide and hydrogen.

• Pyrolysis is a variation of gasification but uses no oxygen in the thermal decomposition of the feedstock.

• Syngas can be burned directly as a fuel or used as a feedstock to produce methanol and hydrogen, or it can be converted via the Fischer-Tropsch process into synthetic liquid fuel.

• In direct coal liquefaction, part of the coal is dissolved under high temperature and hydrogen partial pressure to produce synthetic crude oil or further hydrocracked to finished gasoline and diesel products.