Senate panel to assess IGCC, ‘clean tech’ sector
Posted on July 30th, 2007By Debra Kahn
E&E News: The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee this week takes up technological advances in clean coal, in an effort to spur commercialization of more efficient and environmentally friendly ways to generate electricity from the nation’s most abundant power source.
Officials from the Energy Department, power producers and users of clean coal technology have been asked to appear before the panel to update senators on progress and needs.
A Dow Chemical Co. executive, for instance, is expected to discuss how the company is exploring clean tech options in other countries, a spokesman said. Dow has signed a memorandum of understanding with Shenhua Coal of China and has agreed to partner with Brazilian sugarcane processor CrystalSev to obtain polyethylene for chemical and plastics production.
Dow is “moving our investments to places where we see lower-cost feedstocks,” spokesman Chris Huntley said. “We are interested in exploring clean coal technology as one of a number of alternative feedstock sources that we really need to begin to explore in the United States if we’re going to sustain a viable chemical industry.”
DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory, the director of which will be testifying Wednesday, released a report late last month on costs. It found that of the most modern coal technology — pulverized coal combustion, integrated gasification combined cycles (IGCC) and natural gas combined cycles (NGCC)– currently available for commercialization, total plant costs without carbon capture range from $554 per kilowatt for NGCC to $1,841 per kilowatt for IGCC. With carbon capture, the costs nearly double (E&ENews PM, June 27).
Last month, Houston-based Tondu Corp. said it was suspending plans to build Texas’ first commercial-scale power plant equipped with IGCC technology, citing high costs and other concerns related to technology and construction risks. The company said it would consider changing its plans again “if gasification becomes economically competitive and the various risk issues have been fully addressed” (E&ENews PM, June 13).
Another possibility is underground coal gasification, which uses the earth’s crust as an alternative to converting the coal in an expensive gasifier. The relative economy of adding carbon capture and sequestration to the process makes it a viable alternative to natural gas, researchers say, and earlier this month BP and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory signed a cooperative agreement to advance UCG technology by pooling technical resources to look at its carbon capture potential (Greenwire, July 16).
Also testifying is the CEO of Powerspan, which develops and commercializes technology to control what is seen as clean coal’s greatest challenges: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and particulate matter byproducts. Powerspan’s Electro-Catalytic Oxidation technology removes those substances, as well as mercury, and produces fertilizer as byproduct.
Schedule: The hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 1, at 9:30 a.m. in 366 Dirksen.
Witnesses: Carl Bauer, director, National Energy Technology Laboratory, Department of Energy; Jerry Hollinden, senior vice president, URS Corp.; Jeffrey Phillips, program manager, Electric Power Research Institute; Don Langley, vice president and chief technology officer, Babcock & Wilcox; Andrew Perlman, CEO, Great Point Energy; Frank Alix, CEO, Powerspan; Jim Rosborough, commercial director, Dow Chemical Co.; and Bill Fehrman, president, PacifiCorp Energy.