Clean Coal: If It Can't Make It There, It Can't Make It Anywhere
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 09. 9.07
They can't get enough carbon dioxide in Saskatchewan; they actually import it from the States to inject into oil wells to stimulate production. Thus it was the perfect place to build a coal fired power plant that would separate out the CO2, where there was a market for the stuff. It was going to use a process called Oxyfuel, where the coal is burned in "synthetic air" where the nitrogen is removed, so the products of combustion are almost pure CO2 and water. "SaskPower's Clean Coal™ Project will introduce technology capable of capturing at least 90 per cent of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The additional use of SO2, NOX, mercury and particulate control and capture mechanisms will result in a near-zero emissions facility." and "This CO2 will be sold for enhanced oil recovery operations in southeast Saskatchewan, possibly generating enough revenue to offset the cost of its capture and delivery."
Not quite. Projected costs are out of control, soaring from $ 1.7 Billion to $ 3.8 Billion, and Sask Power has pulled the plug. "We remain fully committed to exploring clean coal as a supply option in the longer term," SaskPower president Pat Youzwa said yesterday."But given the need for new supply by 2010, and given the costs of clean coal at this early stage in its development, it would have been premature to proceed to the construction phase at this time." So they are going to build natural gas plants instead. So much for that fantasy. ::Globe and Mail
As soon as a few more climate monsters come out of the closet, the coal industry is going to start begging for public funds to give another run at this.
The current mistake is to start the design process with the "100% solution" as goal. The project sponsors in utiltiies do this in the same manner that the auto industry pumps out prototype green cars that are never built, so as to delay the day of reconning thrugh PR.
If they could sequester half the carbon emissions and go beyond current NOX and SOX guidlines,m that would be real progress.
cheaper likely for the coal comps to buy CO2 offsets
By the time clean coal technology becomes economically feasible, most renewable energy technologies will be much cheaper to implement. At which point, no one will be willing to set up a clean coal power plant because the electrical energy costs will be more expensive than that of renewable energy. Much the same goes for third generation nuclear technology. Seems to me that most people arguing that coal can be clean are just blowing smoke to get negative pressure off of their building and operating new 'dirty' coal plants.
The headline may say it all:" Clean coal: If it can't make it there, it can't make it anywhere" and that's unfortunate. The proposed CO2 sequestering plant is instead going to be a conventional natural gas fired powerplant, with CO2 enissions not captured. True, gas plants produce less CO2 per kWh, but still plenty. Am I correct in thinking that there is no operating power plant that actually sequesters CO2, just proposals and plans, not even a working demo? It's always seemed that it would be too expensive to collect and transport the CO2, even if the storage issues are worked out to compete with nuclear and wind... DB