Petroleum coke, as far as quantity is concerned, is the most important raw material, and it is formed in a wide range of structures - from highly anisotropic needle coke to nearly isotropic fluid coke. The highly anisotropic needle coke, due to its structure, is

indispensable for the manufacture of high-performance electrodes used in electric arc furnaces, where a very high degree of electrical, mechanical and thermal load-bearing capacity is required. For fine-grained graphites, it plays a less significant role, since its highly ordered structure is destroyed by the crushing and milling operations which are used to obtain a powder with the required low grain size. Petroleum coke is almost exclusively produced by the delayed coking process, which is a mild slow carbonising procedure of crude oil distillation residues. Click here for the table comparing the characteristics of petrol, pitch and metallurgical coke.