2. Impact on the environment

This is one of the aspects to be considered with particular care when starting up a new process, as highlighted in Jean Raguin's article [7] . In this respect, COREX seems to highlight a number of points that can be grouped under the following three headings:

• impact on air ;

• impact on water ;

• by-products, co-products, noise, etc.

Before examining these three points, it should be emphasized that the principle of the COREX process, i.e. the direct injection of coal into a reactor at high temperature (over 1,000°C), leads to an almost total decomposition of the hydrocarbons, more or less saturated, in the coals into CO and H ₂ ....