Applications of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance to Oil Shale Evaluation and Processing

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) is playing an increasing role in the characterization of the organic constituents of fossil fuels. The NMR techniques that currently are being applied to fossil fuel characterization utilize both the 1H and 13C nuclides and can be conveniently divided into those that apply to liquid and those that apply to solid samples. For coals and oil shales, only a small fraction of the organic material can be extracted under the mild conditions that would be expected to retain the primary structural integrity of the organic material. Therefore NMR techniques usually applied to liquids are not applicable to these solid materials; instead NMR techniques developed for solid materials must be applied.