El presente trabajo tiene por finalidad considerar los siguientes puntos:<br /> a) El proceso natural de bituminizaci&oacute;n del carb&oacute;n.<br /> b) La relaci&oacute;n entre bit&uacute;menes y propiedades coquizantes del carb&oacute;n.<br /> c) Caracter&iacute;sticas bitum&iacute;nicas del carb&oacute;n de R&iacute;o Turbio y perspectivas para su coquizaci&oacute;n.<br /> A los efectos de facilitar el desarrollo del tema, primeramente considerar&eacute; algunas generalidades referentes a los carbones desde el punto de vista de su g&eacute;nesis y constituci&oacute;n.In this paper the author explains the now admitted ideas about the formation of bitumens in mineral coal. According with these ideas, there are humic and liptobiolitic bitumens. The humic ones condition principally the coking properties of coal in connection with other physical and petrographical factor s.<br /> It is possible to accept that in the Rio Turbio coal both, humic and liptobiolitic bitumens, are present in different pro- portions. For this reason it would be possible to localize, within such coal basin, partial reserves of mineral with higher coking qualities than those known at the present time.