The pyrolysis behaviors of vitrinite and inertinite from Chinese Pingshuo coal were investigated by using the thermogravimetry coupled with mass spectrometry (TG-MS) and in a fixed bed reactor, respectively. The results showed that inertinite has lower pyrolysis reactivity, lower tar and gas yields, but higher water yield than vitrinite. At 650 degrees C, the tar and gas yield of vitrinite is 22.4% and 14.4%, respectively, obviously higher than 13.4% and 10.2% of inertinite. The TG-MS analysis also showed much difference of vitrinite and inertinite in gas evolution profile. The ultimate and XRD analyses of chars indicated that the difference in element composition of vitrinite char and inertinite char decreases with the increase of temperature, and have similar element composition and structure characteristic at 650 C. The total sulfur removal of both vitrinite and inertinite increases with the pyrolysis temperature, and reaches to 60% at 650 degrees C, but the organic sulfur in inertinite seems more stable than that in vitrinite. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.