Basic research on fuel gas production from nascent coal volatiles was conducted in a two-stage fixed-bed reactor. The volatiles from coal carbonization decomposed in the reactor. Indonesian natural limonite ore dramatically promoted coal volatile decomposition at 873-1023 K in ambient pressure and the carbon yields, except in tar, were above 97.8%. We compared these results to experiments without a catalyst. Subsequently, coal tar converted more completely and more than twice the amount of methane-rich product gases were obtained using the limonite catalyst. In addition, catalyst sulphur poisoning was scarcely observed in the H2S-H-2-N-2 (H2S/H-2: 0.002-0.004) system at 923 K. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.