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Clean Coal's CO2 Technology
 Modifying coal power plants to reduce their CO2 emissions.  What is being done with coal.

WEB LINKS   NEWS ITEMS   FACTOIDS   for this subject.
 

Modifying coal power plants to reduce their CO2 emissions

# 1.   CLEAN COAL Convert to "Clean Coal's" CO2 capture and storage (CCS)

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.  Obama made a TV ad strongly supporting 'Clean Coal'.

'Clean Coal' Made Simple: The Swedish company, Vattenfall, have prepared an excellent set of explanations covering the three 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/www/co2_en/co2_en/399403facts/399433captu/399529oxyfu/index.jsp 

Precombustion Capture:          http://www.vattenfall.com/www/co2_en/co2_en/399403facts/399433captu/399496pre-c/index.jsp

Postcombustion Capture:        http://www.vattenfall.com/www/co2_en/co2_en/399403facts/399433captu/399463post-/index.jsp 

Postcombustion Capture is being looked at as the technology best-suited to bring the world's existing 143,000 fossil fuel-burning power plants under control.  A leakage of 25% 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 injected into an underground disposal well. 

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, an estimated 25% leakage of CO2 with a 25% loss of electricity output due to powering the CO2 capture equipment will increase electricity's coal cost at least 1.5 times.   Clean Coal Myths  pdf   U.S. News and World Report:  Why Clean Coal Is Years Away.pdf

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://www.Biology.lsa.UMich.edu/~gwk/research/nyos.html  and   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.

 

# 2.   BIOMASS Convert to burning biomass such as wood pellets, municipal waste. 

Excellent idea in that biomass is not a "fossil" fuel and is considered to be "carbon neutral."  Bottom Line: It is being done.  CO2 produced is "carbon neutral," toxins diverse but usually known, fuel sources tiny compared with coal or natural gas, cost probably higher per kWh than with fossil fuels.

 

# 3.   NATURAL GAS Convert from burning coal to burning "Clean Natural Gas" 

Adding simple gas burners is a very quick and cheap conversion to make.  The down side of this is that natural gas makes 2/3 as much CO2 per kiloWatt hour as coal.  Bottom Line: It is being done.  Environmental benefit of 33% CO2 reduction, coal toxins eliminated, same amount of electricity, going from coal to natural gas substantially increases fuel cost.

[My natural gas CO2 data source:  http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/FTPROOT/environment/co2emiss00.pdf  The DOE-EIA web page (Table 4) is saying 1.3 pounds of CO2 per kiloWatt hour (kWh) is made by natural gas-burning power plants.  Coal makes about 2.0 pounds of CO2 per kWh.]

 

# 4.   ADD NATURAL GAS TURBINES Convert by adding natural gas burning turbine generators. 

This combined heat cycle squeezes more electricity out of the fuel.  The gas turbine's hot exhaust is then also used to heat the heat recovery steam generators to make steam for the original coal steam turbines. (Right, right)  Bottom Line: It is being done.  More electricity usually makes even more total CO2, coal toxins eliminated, going from coal to natural gas substantially increases fuel cost.

In situations where grid-attached wind power is also involved, a turbine's quick power response helps to keep the grid stable as the wind dies and surges.  Turbines are much quicker than coal or nuclear.  The old steam part would follow along as best it could.

http://www.energysolutionscenter.org/DistGen/Tutorial/CombTurbine.htm   Source: TechPro DTE Energy Bob Fegan 2002

 

 

What this web site is suggesting:

# 5.   CONVERT FROM COAL TO NUCLEAR 

Upgrade from coal to nuclear.  The world's 5,000 largest coal-burning power plants would be the first to be converted from coal heat to nuclear heat by using small ship-sized underground reactors buried in the power plant's coal yard.  Nuclear energy causes about 1% the CO2 coal produces (this from uranium and thorium mining) so a huge environmental benefit is available with nuclear.  

Bottom Line:  Unknown idea, untried as a coal to nuclear conversion.   All technology and equipment exists.  Will provide maximum environmental benefit - zero emissions of any kind - zero CO2 and coal toxins, same amount of electricity, fuel cost about same as coal but well below gas.

 

 

 

WEB LINKS   NEWS ITEMS   FACTOIDS   for this subject. 

France To Shut About Half Of Coal-Fired Power Plants By 2015.
Bloomberg News (6/4, Patel) reports, "France will shut about half its coal-fired power stations by 2015 under a plan to lower energy consumption, cut carbon emissions and more than double the share of energy from renewable resources by 2020." Pierre-Marie Abadie, head of energy at the Ecology and Energy Ministry said that "the plants targeted for closure are operated by state- controlled Electricite de France SA, Europe's biggest power producer, and E.ON France, formerly Endesa/SNET." Abadie also said, "French coal-fired generators produce 7 gigawatts of power at seven sites." Other European nations have taken measures to promote "cleaner-burning power plants and alternative energy sources to cut greenhouse-gas emissions blamed for global warming."

ScottishPower Tests CCS Project.
The Financial Times (5/30, Bolger) reported, "A test project to extract carbon dioxide emissions from a Scottish power station was launched" on Friday, marking "the first time they have been captured from a working coal-fired plant in the UK." The article noted that "ScottishPower has installed a small-scale replica of a full carbon capture plant at Longannet in Fife, the UK's second largest power station, which is also close to the depleted North Sea oil and gas fields that scientists believe could make storage reservoirs for CO2." According to "Ignacio Galán, chairman of Iberdrola, the Spanish energy group that owns ScottishPower...the UK could lead the world with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology." The UK government has "plans to back up to four 'clean coal' power stations that will capture and store CO2."

Trash Incineration More Eco-Friendly Than Landfills, Study Says.
The Wall Street Journal (5/15, A9, Ball) reports, "Over the past two decades, the U.S. has shut down hundreds of pollution-spewing waste incinerators on the belief that burning detritus was a bigger environmental sin than burying it," and "today, most American garbage is sent to landfills." But, while they "have been convenient," landfills are losing support "as improved technology and changing environmental priorities start to upend the old thinking about garbage. ... Dirty air is still a concern," however, "now it has been eclipsed by fears of global climate change," as "recent research suggests, burning trash is better than burying it." Notably, "most modern incinerators...don't only torch trash," but "they also use the heat from the incineration to boil water, which creates steam, which in turn generates electricity." Although, "landfills, too, produce potential fuel -- in the form of methane, which can be captured and used to generate electricity," according to "a recent study by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency researchers...most landfills fail to capture all of their methane, a potent greenhouse gas." The EPA "study concluded that incinerating a ton of trash emits at least 35% less greenhouse gas and yields 10 times as much electricity as burying it."