[cdn-nucl-l] 'Futuregen" Zero-Emission Coal plant

["Adam Mclean" <adam.mclean@utoronto.ca>]

Posted by the DOE on February 6, 2006 and at:
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/
And mentioned in the recent state of the union address.
Coal gasification -> hydrogen
Hydrogen -> clean burn (275 MW) / fuel cells / petroleum upgrade
Carbon -> sequestered deep underground
Competition for nuclear?

Adam

----------------

Issued on:  December 6, 2005 
FutureGen Project Launched

Government, Industry Agree to Build Zero-Emissions Power Plant of the Future
  
Washington, DC - Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman today announced that the
Department of Energy has signed an agreement with the FutureGen Industrial
Alliance to build FutureGen, a prototype of the fossil-fueled power plant of
the future.  The nearly $1 billion government-industry project will produce
electricity and hydrogen with zero emissions, including carbon dioxide, a
greenhouse gas.  
 
The initiative is a response to President Bush's directive to develop a
hydrogen economy by drawing upon the best scientific research to address the
issue of global climate change.  Today's announcement marks the official
"kick-off" for the FutureGen Project.  Over the next year, site selection,
design activities, and environmental analyses will lay the groundwork for
final project design, construction, and operation.   
 
"This agreement places the Alliance members among the world's most
responsible and forward-thinking coal and energy companies," Secretary
Bodman said, as he praised them for their initiative.  "The prototype plant
will be a stepping-stone toward future coal-fired power plants that not only
will produce hydrogen and electricity with zero-emissions, but will operate
with some of the most advanced, cutting-edge technologies. "
 
The FutureGen Industrial Alliance will contribute $250 million to the
project.  Current Alliance members are: American Electric Power (Columbus,
Ohio); BHP Billiton (Melbourne, Australia); CONSOL Energy Inc. (Pittsburgh,
Pa.); Foundation Coal (Linthicum Heights, Md.); China Huaneng Group
(Beijing, China); Kennecott Energy (Gillette, Wyo.); Peabody Energy (St.
Louis, Mo.); and Southern Company (Atlanta, Ga.). 
 
The Industrial Alliance plans to issue a site selection solicitation in
early 2006, to develop a short list of the most qualified candidate sites by
mid-2006, and to make a final site selection in mid to late 2007. 
 
FutureGen will initiate operations around 2012 and virtually every aspect of
the prototype plant will be based on cutting-edge technology.  The project
will integrate testing of emerging energy supply and utilization
technologies as well as advanced carbon capture and sequestration systems.
Technologies planned for testing at the prototype plant could provide future
electric power generation with zero-emissions that is only 10 percent higher
in cost than today's electricity.
 
At the heart of the project will be coal gasification technologies that can
eliminate common air pollutants such as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides
and convert them to useable by-products such as fertilizers and soil
enhancers.  Mercury pollutants will also be removed.
 
These technologies also will turn coal into a highly enriched hydrogen gas,
which can be burned much more cleanly than directly burning the coal itself.
Alternatively, the hydrogen can be used in a fuel cell to produce
ultra-clean electricity, or fed to a refinery to help upgrade petroleum
products.  In the future, the plant could also become a model
hydrogen-production facility for President Bush's initiative to develop a
new fleet of hydrogen-powered cars and trucks.
 
Carbon sequestration will be one of several key features that will set the
prototype plant apart from other electric power plant projects.  FutureGen
will be designed to capture carbon dioxide and sequester it in deep
underground geologic formations.  No other power plant in the world has been
built with this capability. The initial goal will be to capture 90 percent
of the plant's carbon dioxide, but capture of nearly 100 percent may be
possible with advanced technologies.
 
Once captured, the carbon dioxide will be injected as a compressed
liquid-like fluid deep underground, perhaps into saline reservoirs thousands
of feet below the surface of much of the United States.  It could even be
injected into oil or gas reservoirs, or into unmineable coal seams, to
enhance petroleum or coalbed methane recovery. Once trapped in these
formations, the greenhouse gas would be permanently isolated from the
atmosphere. The project will include an intensive measurement and monitoring
effort to verify the efficacy of carbon sequestration.
 
The FutureGen plant will be sized to generate approximately 275 megawatts of
electricity, which is roughly equivalent to a medium-size coal-fired power
plant and sufficient to supply electricity to approximately 275,000 average
U.S. households.
 
The ultimate goal for the FutureGen plant is to show how new technology can
dramatically reduce concerns over atmospheric emissions of pollutants from
the future use of coal. Coal is the most abundant fossil fuel in the United
States with supplies projected to last 250 years at the current utilization
rate and is the workhorse of the United States' electric power sector,
supplying more than half of the electricity the nation consumes.
 
FutureGen's production of hydrogen will support the President's call to
create a hydrogen economy and provide fuel for emissions-free vehicles, and
the use of coal will help provide for America's energy security by
developing technologies that utilize a plentiful domestic resource.

The FutureGen Initiative was initially announced by President Bush in
February 2003.  The project is being funded through the Department's Office
of Fossil Energy and will be managed by the National Energy Technology
Laboratory.

- End of Techline -
For more information, contact: 
Drew Malcomb, DOE Office of Public Affairs, 202-586-5806

DOE's FutureGen Initiative
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/powersystems/futuregen/index.html

More FutureGen-related Techlines 
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/tlquery.html?qt=keywords:futuregen&qs=&col=tech
line&qp=&qc=&pw=100%25&ws=0&la=&qm=0&st=1&nh=25&lk=1&rf=1&oq=&rq=0