A procedure has been developed to use the recoiled protons produced in neut
ron-proton scattering process for fast, nondestructive determination of the
hydrogen contents of coal samples. Samples from Hungary, Poland and Russia
have been bombarded with 2.85 MeV neutrons from a small home-made neutron
generator and the recoiled protons detected by a simple surface barrier det
ector. To convert proton counts into hydrogen content, a calibration proced
ure was established for the method using prepared standards of known hydrog
en content and range for 2.85 MeV protons. Exploratory results obtained by
this method compare favourably with those obtained by the neutron reflectio
n method.