The Future of Coal

An interdisciplinary MIT faculty group examined the role of coal in a world where constraints on carbon dioxide emissions are adopted to mitigate global climate change. Their report, The Future of Coal, examines how the world can continue to use coal, an abundant and inexpensive fuel, in a way that mitigates, instead of worsens, the global warming crisis.

The report is extremely comprehensive and in my view very objective and should play an important role in determining government policy regarding coal fired power plants.

They are especially critical of the government picking a technology "winner." Although IGCC is the lowest cost solution at the present they contend that super critical pulverized coal plants or oxycombustion plants could be competitive and deserve more funding. They also conclude that a significant reduction of carbon emissions is possible only when a significant price is placed on CO2 emissions.

The remainder of this post is composed of excerpts of key parts of the report.

This report evaluates the technologies and costs associated with the generation of electricity from coal along with those associated with the capture and sequestration of the carbon dioxide produced coal-based power generation. Growing electricity demand in the U.S. and in the world will require increases in all generation options (renewables, coal, and nuclear) in addition to increased efficiency and conservation in its use. Coal is likely to remain an important source of energy in any conceivable future energy scenario.

The report concludes that carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) is the critical enabling technology to help reduce CO2 emissions significantly while also allowing coal to meet the world's pressing energy needs.

According to Dr. Deutch, Institute Professor, Department of Chemistry "As the world's leading energy user and greenhouse gas emitter, the U.S. must take the lead in showing the world CCS can work. Demonstration of technical, economic, and institutional features of CCS at commercial scale coal combustion and conversion plants will give policymakers and the public confidence that a practical carbon mitigation control option exists, will reduce cost of CCS should carbon emission controls be adopted, and will maintain the low-cost coal option in an environmentally acceptable manner."

The central message of the report is:

Demonstration of technical, economic, and institutional features of carbon capture and sequestration at commercial scale coal combustion and conversion plants will

1. give policymakers and the public confidence that this carbon mitigation control option is practical for broad application,
2. shorten the deployment time and reduce the cost for carbon capture and sequestration should a carbon emission control policy be adopted, and
3. maintain opportunities for the use of coal in a carbon constrained world in an environmentally acceptable manner.

Key findings in this study:

• Coal is a low-cost, per BTU, mainstay of both the developed and developing world, and its use is projected to increase. Because of coal's high carbon content, increasing use will exacerbate the problem of climate change unless coal plants are deployed with very high efficiency and large scale CCS is implemented.
• CCS is the critical enabling technology because it allows significant reduction in CO2 emissions while allowing coal to meet future energy needs.
• A significant charge on carbon emissions is needed in the relatively near term to increase the economic attractiveness of new technologies that avoid carbon emissions and specifically to lead to large-scale CCS in the coming decades. We need large-scale demonstration projects of the technical, economic and environmental performance of an integrated CCS system. We should proceed with carbon sequestration projects as soon as possible. Several integrated large-scale demonstrations with appropriate measurement, monitoring and verification are needed in the United States over the next decade with government support. This is important for establishing public confidence for the very large-scale sequestration program anticipated in the future. The regulatory regime for large-scale commercial sequestration should be developed with a greater sense of urgency, with the Executive Office of the President leading an inter agency process.
• The U.S. government should provide assistance only to coal projects with CO2 capture in order to demonstrate technical, economic and environmental performance.
• Today, IGCC appears to be the economic choice for new coal plants with CCS. However, this could change with further RD&D, so it is not appropriate to pick a single technology winner at this time, especially in light of the variability in coal type, access to sequestration sites, and other factors. The government should provide assistance to several "first of a kind" coal utilization demonstration plants, but only with carbon capture.
• Congress should remove any expectation that construction of new coal plants without CO2 capture will be "grandfathered" and granted emission allowances in the event of future regulation. This is a perverse incentive to build coal plants without CO2 capture today.
• Emissions will be stabilized only through global adherence to CO2 emission constraints. China and India are unlikely to adopt carbon constraints unless the U.S. does so and leads the way in the development of CCS technology.
• Key changes must be made to the current Department of Energy RD&D program to successfully promote CCS technologies. The program must provide for demonstration of CCS at scale; a wider range of technologies should be explored; and modeling and simulation of the comparative performance of integrated technology systems should be greatly enhanced.

[Their findings are elaborated in chapter 8 of the report. The complete text of their finding on the relative merits of coal power plants is as follows]

It is premature to select one coal conversion technology as the preferred route for cost-effective electricity generation combined with CCS. With present technologies and higher quality coals, the cost of electricity generated with CCS is cheaper for IGCC than for air or oxygen driven SCPC. For sub-bituminous coals and lignite, the cost difference is significantly less and could even be reversed by future technical advances. Since commercialization of clean coal technology requires advances in R&D as well as technology demonstration, other conversion/combustion technologies should not be ruled out today and deserve R&D support at the process development unit (PDU) scale.

[The complete text of their finding regarding the need for a significant charge on carbon emissions is as follows]

A global carbon charge starting at $25 per ton of CO2 emitted (or nearly $100 per tonne of carbon), imposed initially in 2015 and rising at a real rate of 4% per year, will likely cause adjustments to energy demand, supply technologies and fuel choice sufficient to stabilize mid-century global CO2 emissions from all industrial and energy sources at a level of 26 to 28 gigatons of CO2 per year. Depending on the expansion of nuclear power, the use of coal increases from 20% to 60% above today’s level, while CO2 emissions from coal are reduced to half or a third of what they are today. This level of carbon charge implies an increase in the bus bar cost of U.S. electricity on average of about 40%, or about 20% of the retail cost. A significant contributor to the emissions reduction from coal is the introduction of CCS, which is utilized as an economical response to carbon charges at these levels. In the EPPA model simulations, approximately 60% of coal use employs CCS by 2050 with this carbon charge.

Comments

[Doug]

IGCC is not the leader in CCS, see the announcement by AEP today

[GreyFlcn]

The CO2 captured at Northeastern Station will be used for enhanced oil recovery.
Thats not carbon storage.
Thats just a shell game.

AEP has also signed an MOU with The Babcock & Wilcox Company (B&W), a world leader in steam generation and pollution control equipment design, supply and service since 1867, for a feasibility study of oxy-coal combustion technology.
B&W, in collaboration with American Air Liquide Inc., has been developing oxy-coal combustion, a technology that utilizes pure oxygen for the combustion of coal.
And hows that supposed to be a step forward from IGCC?

Especially Airblown IGCC, which doesn't need pure oxygen to operate.

_

Besides which, Direct Carbon Fuel Cells do better than both of em. Need no water to operate, and give double the generation efficiency.

[Javier Marti]

Hi
I am Javier, the founder of Trendirama.com, the fastest growing community of amateur writers writing about The Future of everything. We would like to invite you to join us and write an article on the website, perhaps "The future of the coal industry" there or on whatever you are passionate about...
It is up to you, you choose the subject.
You would get a link back when you link to your own article, if you wish.
You can even re-use some of what you have here, in the last part of the article, "your view and comments". That would save you time and still be interesting for readers.
And yes, I know you may not have the time. Theoretically, none of us do...;)

Failing that, if you like the project and you can help us spread the word -even if you don't write- it would be great.
Since we are starting, any help is appreciated.

By making this valuable information available online for free, I truly believe we are helping to make the world a better place.
And you could do your bit for the world too, by sharing what you know, as we already do.

Please let us know if you link or mention us, so we can link you back too if you wish.
You can even use our valuable articles on your websites, provided that you link back. Any better offer than that?! :)

Look forward to hearing from you or reading your interesting article at Trendirama!

Best regards
Javier Marti
http://trendirama.com

[Paul Dietz]

And hows that supposed to be a step forward from IGCC?

The Alstom/AEP process can be retrofitted on existing powdered coal plants. The importance of this is difficult to overstate. With a parasitic power consumption of only 15% -- about half that of competing post-combustion processes, and also much lower costs -- this could fundamentally alter the political calculus behind CO2 emission controls in the US.

[Nucbuddy]

GreyFlcn wrote: a technology that utilizes pure oxygen for the combustion of coal.
And hows that supposed to be a step forward from IGCC?

Normal air is 78 percent nitrogen. Combustion in pure oxygen prevents the production of exhaust-contamination that comes in the form of oxidized nitrogen.
babcock.com/pgg/pr/cedfoxyfuel.html

The CEDF will be used to validate a technology called “oxy-coal combustion” that utilizes pure oxygen for the combustion of coal in electricity generating plants. In this system, nitrogen that comes in with the air for the combustion process is eliminated. As a result, the exhaust gas is a relatively pure stream of CO2 that is ready for long-term storage operations.

[jcwinnie]

Timely, Jim. Right after the AP story concerning the draft of the next report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Drought and famine affecting millions around the globe.

As more reports come in, there would seem to be more and more spin from coal and oil. Vinod Khosla estimated $80 million was spent on the campaign that failed to defeat SB1 in California.

[amazingdrx]

Conversion to natural gas underground. That's the very best way to use coal.

The natural gas used in fuel cell/turbines. The CO2 feeding algae in solar collectors. That make biodiesel and cellulose that will also run the fuel cell/turbines.

[Gautam K Das]

This is the ERA for Nano Technology, we must go for more intensive research on Renewable Energy Products and Energy Efficient Devices. Coal based TPP has became a threat to wards enviornment. We have to go for a common International Laws on the use of Coal. We have to save our future mankind from Global Worming, by introducing Global Laws.

Gautam K Das
Energy Consultant

[pfoliomanagement]

Portfolio managers have a great deal of responsibility within an organization; not only do they have to be mindful of individuals responsible for managing portfolio components, but they also have to be mindful of executive management, which sets the strategy.

[ティファニー 激安]

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「ティファニー ジェメア」は、18カラットのホワイトゴールドで作られた樽型のケースが特徴で、たくさんのダイヤモンドを散りばめた宝飾時計に仕上がっている。ダイヤモンド1列のモデルとダイヤモンド2列のモデルのほかに、時計の表面に610個のダイヤモンド(3.12カラット)を敷き詰めたフルパヴェのモデルも用意。Tiffany locksこれらの3モデルを、直径22mm / 18mmの2パターンで展開する。ティファニー
その他、ショールームのオープンを記念し、日本初登場となる「ステートメント ウォッチ」「5thアヴェニュー ウォッチ」なども特別展示されるティファニー。
アメリカを代表する世界のプレミア?ジュエラー、ティファニーは1837年の創設以来、時を越えて多くの人々を魅了してきた。ティファニーのジュエリー、シルバー、ウォッチ、そのデザインの数々は何世代にもわたって世界中で愛され続けている。ティファニー 通販

[RMT]

RMT

[生薬]

生薬

[アバクロ]

アバクロ

[coal reports]

For me,let's just hope for the best.We can't ignore the fact of life that we will continue to use coal.Let's just hope for the best and take action on how we can lessen these effects.Which in fact These business industries together with governments is taking actions.Love reading your blog.Keep it up!

[coalportal]

coal statistics would suggest the commodity isn't going anywhere. Coal reports show if we have to live with it, we may as well reduce the impact of coal and CCS seems to be the best solution found to date. Cherry www.coalportal.comWhile for some an ideal world would see no reliance on coal industry to produce electricity,

[Furniture Stores Burbank]

With the research of new technologies it seems that coal might be going out of popularity and use.

[モンクレール]

The report is extremely comprehensive and in my view very objective and should play an important role in determining government policy regarding coal fired power plants.

[アバクロ]

With the research of new technologies it seems that coal might be going out of popularity and use.