Developing a coal to ethylene glycol
(CtEG) process is of great
interest to many countries, especially China. However, because the
hydrogen to carbon ratio of the coal-gasified gas is far less than
the desired value, the CtEG process suffers from high CO<sub>2</sub> emission and wastes precious carbon resources. At the same, most
coke oven gas (COG) is discharged directly or used as fuel, resulting
in a waste of resources, serious environmental pollution, and economic
loss. To develop efficient and clean utilization of coal and COG resources,
we propose a novel coke oven gas assisted coal to ethylene glycol
(CaCtEG) process. The proposed process introduces the hydrogen-rich
COG to adjust the hydrogen to carbon ratio and reduce CO<sub>2</sub> emission by integrating a dry methane reforming unit. Key operational
parameters are investigated and optimized based on the established
mathematical model. The advantages of the process are studied by a
detailed techno-economic analysis. Results show that, compared with
the conventional CtEG process, the CaCtEG process is promising since
it increases the carbon element and exergy efficiency by 18.35% and
10.59%. The CO<sub>2</sub> emission ratio of the proposed process
is reduced from 2.58 t/t-EG to 0.44 t/t-EG. From an economic point
of view, the CaCtEG process can save production costs by 5.11% and
increase the internal rate of return by 3.41%. The capital investment,
however, is slightly increased because of the two additional units
