A method and apparatus for continuously carbonizing materials while co-producing gases in a coking chamber closed to the atmosphere, having a charger at one end comprising a pushing ram surrounding a mandrel that surrounds an air or oxygen injection lance. The other end of the coking chamber collects and separates coke from gases, with coke directed to a closed quenching chamber and gases directed to a cleanup. Thermal energy for converting coal into coke derives from combusting some metallurgical coal by said lance. In the case of producing coke from metallurgical coal, which is expensive because of limited supply, the herein method and apparatus are configured to separately charge a low-cost, abundant, carbonizing material and expensive metallurgical coal so that metallurgical coal surrounds the low-cost carbonizing material, and a lance combusts the low-cost carbonizing material, releasing thermal energy that heats metallurgical coal under reducing conditions, producing specification coke and gases more economically. After cleanup, gases are used as chemical feedstock or fuel. The word “coke” herein used may also be referred to as “charcoal” or “char.”