The yield, properties and composition of soluble and insoluble (kerogen) organic matter (OM) of oil shale (OS) from the Uvurjargalant deposit of Mongolia have been investigated in this study. The study results show that oil shale contains a low amount of moisture and volatile products, while the ash yield is high, 80.43 %, which implies that most parts of oil shale are minerals. The total amount of bitumens in oil shale was very low, 1.24 wt%, whereas the kerogen content was 22.84 wt%, which is relatively high compared to oil shales from other deposits in Mongolia. According to infrared (IR) spectral analysis and the ratio of hydrogen to carbon, the Uvurjargalant oil shale belongs to type I of oil shale. The thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) showed that the organic matter of oil shale decomposed in the temperature range of 300–750 °C and produced gas and liquid products. The pyrolysis tar of Uvurjargalant oil shale was subjected to an air distillation and four fractions were obtained, including one light fraction, two middle fractions and one heavy fraction with the following boiling temperatures: < 180 °C, 180–250 °C, 250–320 °C, > 320 °C, respectively. The yields of each fraction were determined. The silica gel chromatography (SGC) of the first three distilled fractions of oil shale pyrolysis tar with different boiling temperatures shows the greater part of each fraction to be soluble in dichloromethane (M) and the minor part to be soluble in hexane (H). This means that the three fractions are mostly polar compounds. On the basis of the results of gas chromatographic-mass spectrometric (GC/MS) analysis of the distilled light fraction, the fraction distilled at 180–250 °C and the one distilled at 250–320 °C obtained by SCG eluted with hexane, toluene (B) and dichloromethane, respectively. In total, 128 organic compounds soluble in hexane, 83 compounds soluble in toluene and 57 compounds soluble in dichloromethane were identified.
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