<HTML>Anthony
I have been searching all day, and now I have some results.
Ammonia is produced from a combination of hydrogen and nitrogen. As you saw above it is also produced through the interaction of water, hydrocarbons and air. Coal contains traces of ammonium, when it is burnt it releases ammonia, it also releases hydrocarbons into the atmosphere. Trees/timber also contain organic ammonium, how is this. Well just about all soils contain organic ammonium, plants absorb nitrates and ammonium from the soil. Animals eat plants and thus absorb that ammonium into themselves. So organic ammonium exists in all biological lifeforms.
When you burn timber, it releases that ammonium back into the atmosphere, but it also releases arromatic hydrocarbons in the woodsmoke. The burning of biomass creates large amounts of atmospheric ammonia.
Ammonia is also produced by the decomposition of animal or plant material, and the nitrates and organic ammonium pass back into the soil. Ammonium exists in the atmosphere, which is the largest repository of it. It exists in the soil, which is the second largest repository. It exists in seawater, rivers, and groundwater.
It also exists in marine life, when that marine life dies and drifts to the bottom to form carbonate rocks, that ammonium is locked up within that carbonate structure. So there is ammonium in limestone, trapped there during it's formation.
A further introduction of ammonium into limestone is when it is no longer under the sea, when it is on dryland it is covered in soil and biomass, which contain large amounts of organic ammonium. It is also subjected to ground water penetration which contains quantities of organic ammonium. Plus it is also exposed to atmospheric ammonium.
Construction lime, and cement contains a residue from industrial chimneys and furnaces, this residue is called flyash, this flyash has varying quantities of ammonia locked up in it, because industry uses ammonia to keep their chimneys clean. Thus you have the inclusion of an ammonia substance into lime mortar, but there is more than that. The tarry residue that forms in chimneys(creosote) from coal and wood smoke, has trapped hydrocarbons in it. I have the feeling that when the wet lime mortar comes into contact with this creosote and soot, a chemical reaction takes place, this results in the release of ammonia from these substances.
It all seems very complex, you have ammonia in lime mortar, you have hydrocarbons in woodsmoke residue, you have the formation of ammonia through the interaction of water(wet lime mortar), air, and hydrocarbons(creosote/soot).
Well sandy J, you may have considered it 'UNHEARD OF' before, but you have certainly heard of it now.
Sandy J fell very short of the mark, when only quoting animal sacrifice as a source for organic ammonium. I would not call that good science, I would call it very selective science. Only putting forward information that conforms to a particular theory. Where does all this extra information place the geopolymer and zk20 theory now?
[
earth.usc.edu]
[
www.uvi.edu]
[
www.fbe.unsw.edu.au]
[
www.aci-int.org]
[
www.munley.com]
[
www.google.com]
[
www.google.com]
[
www.google.com]
[
www.pbs.org]
7.1.6 Products of Coal Carbonization
The reactions occurring during the carbonization of coal for the production of metallurgical coke
are complex. The process can be considered as taking place in three steps: (a) primary breakdown
of coal at temperatures below 700°C (1296°F) yields decomposition products some of which are
water, oxides of carbon, hydrogen sulfide, hydroaromatic compounds, paraffins, olefins, phenolic,
and nitrogen-containing compounds; (b) secondary thermal reactions among these liberated pri-
mary products as they pass through hot coke, along hot oven walls and through highly heated free
space in the oven involve both synthesis and degradation. A large evolution of hydrogen and the
formation of aromatic hydrocarbons and methane occur in the stage above 700°C (1296°F).
Decomposition of the complex nitrogen-containing compounds produces ammonia, hydrogen
cyanide, pyridine bases and nitrogen; (c) progressive removal of hydrogen from the residue in the
oven produces hard coke.
During carbonization, from 2035% by weight of the initial charge of coal is evolved as mixed
gases and vapors which pass from the ovens into the collecting mains and are processed through
the coal-chemical recovery section of the coke plant to produce coal chemicals. When the produc-
tion of coke is accomplished in modern byproduct coke ovens with equipment for recovering the
coal chemicals, one ton of coking coal in typical American practice yields about the following pro-
portions of the coke and coal chemicals presented in Table 7.1, depending upon the type of coal
carbonized, carbonization temperature and method of coal-chemical recovery.
The coke oven gas contains the fixed gases so classified because they are gases at 760 mm (29.92
in.) pressure and 15.5°C (60°F). They are: hydrogen, H2; methane, CH4; ethane, C2H6; carbon
monoxide, CO; carbon dioxide, CO2; illuminants which are essentially unsaturated hydrocarbons,
such as ethylene, C2H8; and acetylene, C2H2. Other fixed gases present are: hydrogen sulfide, H2S;
ammonia, NH3; oxygen, O2; and nitrogen, N2.</HTML>
