The proposed rule — years in the making and approved by the White House after months of review — will require any new power plant to emit no more than 1,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt of electricity produced. The average U.S. natural gas plant, which emits 800 to 850 pounds of CO2 per megawatt, meets that standard; coal plants emit an average of 1,768 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt. - -  Juliet Eilperin, Published: March 26

What does this imply for the United States' 5,000+ existing fossil fuel power plants?

Not Going Nuclear - Using Carbon Capture Technology Instead

                 

Carbon Capture and Sequestration (Storage) Retrofit Technology
 http://www.globalccsinstitute.com/

Modifying fossil fuel power plants to reduce their CO2 emissions
 http://www.carboncapturejournal.com/index.php 

CCS Cost and Performance - IEA .pdf  (April 2010, 1 meg)                    "Clean Coal" Power Plant News Items

Massachusetts Institute of Technology is leading the way in the United States

Massachusetts Institute of Technology Carbon Capture and Sequestration Projects.
Carbon Capture - Retrofitting of Coal-Fired Power Plants for CO2 Emissions Reductions - MIT .pdf

 

 

Worldwide, about 200 Carbon Capture and Sequestration projects in over 14 industries
 during 2010 according to Carbon Capture Journal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Carbon Capture and Sequestration Technology is promising
to become a very large industry.

 

A 200 MegaWatt Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) plant is right on the bottom edge of being seriously big.

CCS Coal Generation - US 200 MW FutureGen .pdf

(Right)  It will be an OxyFuel retrofit on an existing oil burner.  Oil is a costly and unusual fuel for the United States.  This avoids coal's solids and impurity problems. 

http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/oxyfuel-combustion.htm

Retrofit or Retire Coal Plants .pdf

Carbon Capture - Linde BASF RWE .pdf

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Right) Postcombustion retrofit.  This deals with coal's solids and impurities.  The world has about 150,000 large coal boilers that could make use of this technology.

http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/postcombustion.htm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EPA Releases CO2 Storage Rules.
The AP (11/23, Daly) reports the Environmental Protection Agency "is imposing new rules to protect drinking water and track the amount of carbon dioxide stored underground by 'clean coal' technology." EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson "said the rules clarify standards for carbon storage, so industry knows what is required as it develops the technology." According to the article, "the administration wants to encourage carbon storage while overcoming liability obstacles that could hinder its development," pointing out that "a sudden release of large amounts of carbon dioxide can kill by asphyxiation," as it did in 1986 when 1,700 people died after "a cloud of carbon dioxide escaped from a volcanic lake in Cameroon." A report compiled by an Administration task force this summer "advised against the government taking on unlimited liability for underground storage of carbon dioxide."

Bloomberg News (11/23, Lomax) adds that "the drinking-water regulation governs the way carbon- dioxide injection wells are located, built, tested, monitored and closed." The task force also said this summer that "rules governing the 'environmental soundness of injecting and storing carbon dioxide underground' must be part of a federal plan to 'facilitate widespread cost-effective deployment' of the pollution-control technology after 2020...A separate EPA rule also released today deals with measuring the amount of carbon dioxide that's captured and stored."
 

Carbon Capture and Storage

Coal CO2 Capture and Storage - CCS.  The only long-term hope for the coal industry.  Billions of tax dollars are being spent worldwide for research.  Only cynical advertising by coal companies to date to mislead and confuse public.  A long, strong supporter of coal, Obama even made a TV ad advocating 'Clean Coal' during his White House campaign.

"Clean Coal" is a tall order.  Vaclav Smil, (pdf, page 22) who has written on energy extensively, tells us that "Sequestering a mere 1/10 of today's global CO2 emissions (less than 3 GigaTons CO2) would thus call for putting in place an industry that would have to force underground every year the volume of compressed gas larger than or (with higher compression) equal to the volume of crude oil extracted globally by a petroleum industry whose infrastructures and capacities have been put in place over a century of development."

 

'Clean Coal' Made As Simple As Possible.

The Swedish company, Vattenfall, have prepared an excellent set of explanations covering the four major coal CO2 capture and sequestration technologies developed so far.  Vattenfall recently designed and built the world's most advanced CCS demonstration facility in Germany.

Oxyfuel Combustion Capture:  http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/oxyfuel-combustion.htm     $50 to $60 per ton CO2.

Precombustion Capture:          http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/precombustion.htm            $25 to $50 per ton CO2.

Postcombustion Capture:         http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/postcombustion.htm          $25 to $75 per ton CO2.

Chemical Looping:                  http://www.vattenfall.com/en/ccs/chemical-looping-.htm 

Postcombustion Capture is being looked at as the technology best-suited to bring the world's existing 60,000 fossil fuel-burning power plants under control.  Its a tough job, only about 10% of the stack gasses are CO2 and the stack can be as hot as 800°F.  A leakage of 50% of the CO2 slipping past the capture system and a 25% loss of electricity output due to powering the CO2 capture equipment is being spoken of as acceptable.  The captured CO2 gas would be compressed to about 1,000 pounds per square inch to liquefy it and then the liquid CO2 would be piped to an underground disposal well, ultimately to be injected into the ground for disposal. 

Bottom Line:  A laboratory experiment, still trying to figure out how to make it happen on existing full-size power plants.  Mostly talk of a "Manhattan Project-Size" effort financed with your tax dollars for coal's benefit.  Zero power plant CO2 has actually been captured so far, may or may not also capture coal toxins.
      U.S. News and World Report:  Why Clean Coal Is Years Away.pdf

 

10% CO2 leakage will kill you.

CO2 Capture and Storage Has A Big Possible Danger:  A potentially dangerous technology. (10% CO2 leakage will kill you.)  CO2 is heavier than air, slow to disperse, and flows to the ground's lowest surfaces such as lowlands and basements.  Since only a 10% concentration of CO2 is lethal to humans, CO2 sequestration creates a deadly leakage risk for nearby residents.  Although a landslide triggered the Lake Nyos CO2 incident which blanketed a 25 square mile area killing over 1,700 people and several herds of cattle by suffocation in Africa in 1986, there is concern of a Bhopal-sized sequestered CO2 leakage accident due to small earthquakes opening tiny blowholes.  Lake Nyos is cited as an example of the potential asphyxiation hazard geologically trapped CO2 creates if released.

Check out what I'm saying at:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Nyos

Google:     Sequestration + Lake Nyos      to get the latest buzz on this environmental hazard.  The EPA and the Sierra Club have it on their radars.  This is a common occurrence.  Ground leakage of natural gas, either spontaneous or as a consequence of drilling for natural gas, is surprisingly common, with several mini-disasters occurring around the world every year.  http://www.abc.net.au/nature/news/NatureNews_1686353.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_Disaster  A link to a description of the Bhopal disaster.

 

 

 

Carbon Capture and Sequestration Costs.   (From Carbon Capture Journal)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Impact of Carbon Capture and Sequestration on our coal reserves.

(Right) Probable loss of our coal reserve life as a consequence of growing our economy on a diet of "Clean Coal" CCS electricity.

(DOE data.  From a speech by Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, 6th District, Maryland)

"There is a basic economic problem with coal/carbon capture that gets far too little attention. Namely, it is the only low/zero carbon generation technology that requires an increase in fuel combustion. As a practical matter, this means that carbon capture will never be economic in any world that provides an incentive for low-carbon generation to come forward -- so long as one assumes that carbon will ultimately be priced in some sort of a market, bid up to the marginal cost of supply. Nuclear, renewables and energy efficiency all have their own economic strengths and weaknesses, but all have innately lower operating costs than a coal plant with CCS, and once built will necessarily cause the price of CO2 reduction to clear below the level required to justify the operation of a CCS facility. One doesn't need to be quantitative to prove this point -- it is sufficient to note merely that the parasitic loads required to operate a CCS plant will increase fuel use, and no one is giving away fuel for free.

For CCS to play a role in CO2 reduction therefore requires that two things will happen: (1) technology development will eventually bring capital costs down to a level necessary to sustain investment and (2) every other CO2 reduction strategy we deploy will be insufficient to meet our CO2 goals and we will have to also run CCS. (And that we will run CCS facilities sufficiently hard to generate revenues necessary to recoup the original investment.) The first might be possible, but is by no means guaranteed. But the second virtually guarantees that the first will never happen. Why would any investor commit to investing in a technology that loses money on the margin? Absent such investor belief, how will we gain sufficient experience to drive capital expenditure down?

By all means, let's get CO2 emissions down. And by all means, let's chase fuel efficiency (including efficient use of coal) as a part of that strategy. But let's be much more skeptical of claims that reducing the efficiency of coal-fired power is the key to an economically-sustainable, carbon-constrained future." - - Sean Casten, President & CEO, Recycled Energy Development, LLC

 

How about a CO2 "Slippage Credit" for fossil power plants that convert to nuclear?

 

(Right) Early results at small-scale research sites.

If plants with carbon capture can let up to 25% of their CO2 slip past the capture equipment, when a fossil fuel heated source converts to nuclear heat, the rules should allow that amount of the plant's former CO2 emissions be used for such things as natural gas heated steam reheaters.

 

 

 

 

 

Clean Coal - - - When we take a close look at the size of Global Warming, we better hope everything works.
 http://www.americaspower.org/
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/powersystems/cleancoal/ 
http://www.coal-is-clean.com/ 
http://www.cleancoalusa.org/ 
http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/coalpower/cctc/index.html 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_coal   
http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200701/coal.asp 
http://www.nrdc.org/OnEarth/05fal/coal1.asp 
http://www.newgencoal.com.au/index.aspx?gclid=cjfbksv115ocfrkaxgodoukufw 

          http://www.eia.doe.gov/iea/elec.html  My favorite electricity data web site

 

 

"Clean Carbon" Power Plant News Items

DOE awards B&W $2.8M for carbon capture research
 20 December 2011  Green Car Congress
 Babcock & Wilcox Power Generation Group, Inc., a subsidiary of The Babcock & Wilcox Company, has been selected to receive $2.8 million in financial assistance funding from the US Department of Energy (DOE) to study chemical formulations to improve the performance of its Regenerable Solvent Absorption Technology (RSAT) process solvent used to capture CO2 from coal-fired power plants. The project will be managed by DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory under its Innovations for Existing Plants (IEP) Program.
B&W will contribute $0.7 million in the form of in-kind research and development to the project, including research personnel and facility space, which will be conducted at the B&W Research Center in Barberton, Ohio. Project participants also include the University of Cincinnati and FirstEnergy Corp., which will act in an advisory role to provide input from a utility operator’s perspective.
B&W is in the process of optimizing our proprietary OptiCap solvent for CO2 capture. This DOE-funded project allows us to explore new options for improving the energy requirements for solvent regeneration, durability and other factors to make the OptiCap solvent an attractive option for post-combustion CO2 capture.

—B&W Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer Don Langley

At its Barberton research facility, B&W has developed and tested multiple technologies to capture CO2 emissions from coal-fired power plants and combat global climate change. These technologies include the post-combustion RSAT process using OptiCap solvent and the oxy-coal combustion process. The facility has several RSAT process pilot systems and chemical analysis apparatus to allow for a full range of product development and testing.

DOE To Hold Hearings On FutureGen Project In June.
The AP (5/24) reports, "The Department of Energy plans three public hearings next month in Illinois on the FutureGen coal-energy project as it gathers information about potential environmental impact." A hearing is scheduled for June 9 in Jacksonville, which is "near the Morgan County site where the project will retool a power plant to use new technology that captures the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide from coal and then store it underground." The AP notes that "a group of coal companies and other firms known as the FutureGen Alliance earlier this year picked the Morgan County town of Meredosia for the project."

The Springfield (IL) State Journal Register (5/24, Landis) adds that "early this year, the FutureGen Alliance selected a site northeast of Jacksonville as the preferred location for a project that is expected to require at least 1,000 acres for the storage facility and buffer zone." Further, "sites near Taylorville and Tuscola are backups should there be problems with the Jacksonville site." DOE has already committed $1 billion to the $1.3 billion project. According to the Register, "An agency representative said Monday the hearings will become part of an environmental impact statement."

 

Power Companies May Need $40 Billion To Meet EPA Mercury Rule.
Bloomberg News (5/5, Main) reports, "Southern Co. and Duke Energy Corp. are among power companies facing a combined $40 billion in costs by 2016 under a proposal aimed at reducing toxic emissions such as mercury at coal-fired plants, according to data compiled by Bloomberg." Bloomberg News based the estimate on EPA's analysis of the controls required to comply with the rule, which is aimed at limiting power plant mercury emission levels. The EPA indicated that the rule would affect about 1,200 coal-fired plants. According to the article, "costs of retrofitting or retiring power plants will fall hardest on companies most dependent on coal-fired generation." Bloomberg News notes that "Duke, Southern, American Electric Power Inc. and the Tennessee Valley Authority are likely to have multibillion-dollar costs."

Saskatchewan approves $1.2B carbon capture project
 26 April 2011
 The Government of Saskatchewan has approved construction of the Boundary Dam Integrated Carbon Capture and Storage Demonstration Project—among the first commercial-scale carbon capture and storage facilities in the world. The C$1.24-billion (US$1.3 billion) project will transform an aging generating unit at the SaskPower Boundary Dam Power Station near Estevan, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by approximately one million tonnes per year in addition to capturing CO2 for enhanced oil recovery.
The Canadian federal government provided $240 million to assist in the development of the project.
SaskPower has chosen SNC Lavalin to oversee detailed engineering, procurement and construction activities at the Boundary Dam project. Cansolv, a wholly owned subsidiary of Shell Global Solutions, will supply the carbon capture process. Hitachi will supply an advanced steam turbine—the first in the world designed to fully integrate a coal-fired power plant with carbon capture technology.
Construction on the project will begin immediately, with operations commencing in 2014. The new generating unit at Boundary Dam will have the capacity to generate 110 megawatts (MW) of electricity.
In addition to capturing CO2 for enhanced oil recovery operations, the Boundary Dam project will also capture sulfur dioxide (SO2) to be used in the production of sulphuric acid.
Boundary Dam Power Station is SaskPower’s largest generating facility, with six units and a combined generating capacity of 824 MW. The company’s three coal-fired power plants account for approximately 50% of its generating capacity of 3,513 MW. SaskPower has a total available generating capacity of 3,982 when the production of independent power producers is taken into account.
The Boundary Dam Integrated Carbon Capture and Storage Demonstration Project is part of a capital program that will see billions of dollars invested in SaskPower’s power production and transmission and distribution systems over the next decade

University Of Wyoming Initiates CO2 Sequestration Project.
The AP (4/23) reported, "A University of Wyoming project to experiment with storing carbon dioxide underground gets going this weekend when a crew starts drilling a hole in the ground in Sweetwater County." According to the newswire, "the Carbon Management Institute at the university and the US Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy are behind the nearly $17 million project." The goal of the project is to determine how "to prevent climate change by capturing carbon dioxide and keeping the greenhouse gas out of the atmosphere by pumping it underground."

Indiana House Of Representatives Approves CO2 Pipeline Measure.
Platts (4/22, Matyi) reports on its website that "the Indiana House of Representatives approved and sent to a conference committee a bill that includes eminent domain language sought by the developer of a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline." According to the article, "prior to the Republican-controlled House's 64-32 vote to pass the bill (S.B. 251), the lawmakers accepted an amendment by State Representative Sue Ellspermann, a Republican, that empowers companies like Dallas-based Denbury Resources to condemn private property for a CO2 pipeline that would move gas from several clean coal plants in the Midwest to the Gulf Coast for use in enhanced oil extraction." The Republican-controlled Indiana Senate "voted 28-21 in early February to defeat the original Denbury-based pipeline bill (H.B. 72), with some lawmakers objecting to eminent domain."

Future Of FutureGen Project Remains Uncertain.
The Illinois Statehouse News (4/5, Lee) reports that the future of FutureGen's $1.3 billion "clean coal" project is uncertain. According to the report, "there are several hurdles to clear before construction can start on the carbon dioxide storage site in Morgan County." This week a state Senate committee will consider Senate Bill 1821, which "would allow for the construction and operation of a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline with a certificate of approval from the Illinois Commerce Commission." State Sen. William Haine, D-Alton, co-sponsor of the measure, said, "The purpose of this is to lessen environmental damage, have less CO2 in the air, because of the perceived belief that too much CO2 causes global warming and other problems."

CCS Carbon Storage Successes April 2011.pdf    From EnergyBiz Insider

Texas Approves Clean Coal Plant.

The Fort Worth Star Telegram (12/15, Smith) reports the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality approved a $3.5 billion clean coal plan for West Texas. "The Tenaska Trailblazer Energy Center will capture 85 to 90 percent of emissions of carbon dioxide." Sweetwater, Texas will be the home of the plant, while the carbon will be sequestered underground in West Texas. Once sequestered, the carbon "will be used to boost petroleum recovery by an estimated 10 million barrels annually." Upon completion, the plant will generate 600 megawatts of power "and use a cooling technology that reduces water use by 90 percent." Construction, which will begin in 2011, will add up to 1,500 jobs to the local economy. Plant operations means that 100 people will be permanently employed starting in 2016. The AP (12/1) reports adds that the commission voted unanimously.

The Abilene (TX) Reporter-News (12/15) observes that the permit for the plant was approved "despite continued opposition from some environmental groups." Groups such as the Multi-County Coalition and the Sierra Club "vowed to continue a public campaign against Tenaska." The Sierra Club may appeal the permit approval to the state supreme court. Even though the permit was approved, questions remain about the final stages of production since Tenaska as the company has not secured "a needed water source. Tenaska also must develop business contracts related to the sale of electricity from the plant as well as develop plans to market carbon dioxide for use in West Texas oil exploration."
 

6 Sites to Host FutureGen's Carbon Storage
Associated Press (11/17/10) Mercer, David

Six locations in Illinois have shown interest in having a carbon dioxide storage site, as part of FutureGen's clean-coal project. The storage site could produce more than 1,000 short-term jobs and a few dozen permanent ones. The bidders at one location have stated that their level of skepticism is high because they saw politics almost remove the project and make changes to it. "Our team of scientific and engineering experts has already begun review of those proposals, and we look forward to making an announcement on the final site in early 2011," says FutureGen CEO Ken Humphreys. Until earlier this year, the plan proposed a new power plant in Mattoon, Ill., and storing the carbon dioxide right outside town. But the Department of Energy used $1.2 billion in federal stimulus funding to retrofit a coal-burning plant in Meredosia, Ill., to use different technology and pipe the carbon dioxide to another place for underground storage. Despite skepticism, many officials are impressed with the plan because it would provide jobs.

http://www.doosanbabcock.com/live/cme0.htm 

B&W Oxy-Coal Technology To Be Used On $1.2B Future-Gen Project.
The Akron (OH) Beacon Journal (10/9, Downing) reports, "The oxy-coal combustion technology developed by the Babcock & Wilcox Power Generation Group Inc. and Air Liquide Process & Construction will be used on the $1.2 billion Future-Gen project near Matoon, Ill. The two companies were included by the US Department of Energy in cooperative agreements with Ameren Energy Resources Co. LLC and the FutureGen Alliance." The Beacon Journal adds, "The Illinois plant will be the first large-scale, integrated test of an oxy-coal power plant with carbon dioxide capture."

CO2 Capture Using Rocket Nozzles .pdf                               Carbon Capture Technology .pdf 

Hydrogen - First Industrial Scale Power Plant .pdf  They get their hydrogen from a nearby oil refinery.  Hmm.

Rocket Nozzles Could Help Clean Power Plants.
Discovery News (7/6, Klotz) reported ATK, which builds the booster rockets for the shuttle program, "is working to turn rocket nozzle technology into a novel method for cleaning up the carbon-laced air emitted by coal-burning power plants." Under a program funded by the DOE's Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA-E), forcing the exhaust from a smokestack through a nozzle before it is released would eliminate the need for costly chemicals. ATK vice president Robert Bakos said, "Today's carbon capture technology adds 80 percent to the cost per kilowatt hour of electricity delivered. ... With our approach, we could knock that down to 30 percent." Meanwhile, "The company plans to demonstrate the technology in a laboratory within 14 months, then move on to a pilot program at a power plant."

According to Popular Science (7/7, Dillow), which references the Discovery News article, "the ability to effectively pull CO2 out of coal emissions could restore coal's place as a viable alternative to foreign oil and as a cleaner bridge to a renewable energy future. Of course, the technology has to work first."

For Some Midwest States, Plans For Clean Coal Plant Turn Costly.
The Chicago Tribune (7/11, Hawthorne) reported, "Sold on a promise of cheap, clean electricity, dozens of communities in Illinois and eight other Midwest states instead are facing more expensive utility bills after bankrolling a new coal-fired power plant," the Prairie State Energy Campus, "that will be one of the nation's largest sources of climate-change pollution." The plant's "price tag already has more than doubled to $4.4 billion - costs that will largely be borne by municipalities," and "the communities are locked into 28-year contracts that will require higher electricity rates to cover the construction overruns."

 

OriginOil lands first order for industrial-scale algae oil extraction system; Bio-CCS

31 January 2011

OriginOil, Inc. has received the first commercial order to deploy its algae oil extraction system in an industrial setting. MBD Energy (MBD) recently committed to purchase an initial OriginOil extraction unit for piloting at one of Australia’s three largest coal-fired power plants. (Earlier post.) MBD Energy expects OriginOil technology to support a pilot Bio-CCS (Bio-based Carbon Capture and Storage) algal synthesizer system at Queensland’s Tarong Power Station.

The proof of concept phase on a one-hectare site, scheduled for later this year, will use concentrated CO2 emissions to produce oil-rich algae in MBD’s proprietary growth membranes. OriginOil’s extraction technology will be used to harvest the algae oil and biomass.

This first extraction system will support early testing at the Tarong site. A much larger unit is intended to replace it later this year to process up to 300 gallons per minute (300 gpm) of algae culture for the one-hectare pilot site, at which point the first unit will be deployed at the next power station pilot site, and so on. Together, the recently-committed initial unit and the full system for the Tarong proof-of-concept site, if approved, may generate as much as US$1 million in product and service sales for OriginOil.

—Riggs Eckelberry, CEO of OriginOil

Subject to successful trials and mutual agreement with its power station partners, MBD said each project at Australia’s three largest coal-fired power stations has the potential to grow from an initial one hectare (2.47 acre) proof of concept facility to become fully commercial facilities.

Each facility would then be capable of consuming significant amounts of CO2 and producing commercial quantities of high-value oil suitable for manufacture of transport fuel and plastics.

We are excited to be building a pilot facility that uses the power station’s CO2-laden flue-gas to feed a Bio-CCS algal synthesizer. We expect this to serve as proof of concept for a larger, second stage facility of up to 80 hectares (197 acres) and possibly a much larger third stage project after that.

—Andrew Lawson, Managing Director of MBD Energy, Ltd.

MBD estimated that subject to performance at the 80 hectare level and mutual agreements, each Stage 3 full-scale production facility has the potential to grow to 1600 hectares (3,900 acres) and could produce around 300 million liters (over 79 million gallons) of transport (or plastics) oil per year, as well as other valuable commodities, and consume, at full scale, more than half of each power station’s CO2 emissions.

OriginOil and MBD recently entered into a strategic agreement protecting OriginOil’s intellectual property for demonstration projects and granting mutual marketing rights.