CHARACTERIZATION OF SHALE OILS .1. ANALYSIS OF FISCHER ASSAY OILS ANDTHEIR AROMATIC FRACTIONS USING ADVANCED ANALYTICAL TECHNIQUES

High-temperature, short-contact-time pyrolysis of oil shales was inves tigated in our laboratory to gain a better understanding of the reacti on mechanisms of kerogen decomposition. In order to accomplish this go al, the chemical composition of condensable materials and compositiona l differences between these materials and oils produced by low-tempera ture slow-heating processes were obtained. Analytical techniques that can analyze samples in microgram quantities, such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), proton nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, field ionization mass spectroscopy (FIMS), and synchrono us fluorescence (SF) spectroscopy were chosen for product characteriza tion. Liquid chromatography was used in this work to separate shale oi ls into class types as well as in product characterization. Our work w as in two phases. The first phase was on conventional oils. Here, HPLC as a tool for the separation of the aromatic fraction into subfractio ns according to the ring sizes and the possibility of using FIMS for a detailed compositional analysis of aromatic fraction of a fuel were i nvestigated. The results were encouraging. The subfractions of the aro matic fraction were also analyzed using SF. The results of SF validate d the HPLC separation procedure. In any case, the thrust of this resea rch was to combine the results of several techniques to obtain meaning ful and reliable characterization of oil shale pyrolysis products. Thi s report covers the results obtained for oils produced by low-temperat ure slow-heating processes.