I frequently hear the candidates pushing clean coal technology as part of their energy platforms.
The cynic in me has questioning:
1) How clean is this technology really?
2) What is the economic viability of large-scale adoption of this technology?
3)How long will it take before every coal-fired power plant is retro fitted with this technology?
The candidates often group clean coal in the same category as renewable energy. I would be interested in hearing the panelists flush out this idea of clean coal technology and whether or not it should be a priority for the next president.
4 comments:
The term "clean coal" itself is kind of a misnomer. The technology is otherwise known as "carbon sequestration and capture" (CCS) - the idea that the carbon emitted from coal-fired power plants can be captured, pumped into the ground and stored indefinitely.
The Carnegie Mellon Engineering and Public Policy department does a lot of research in this area with respect to the technical issues involved.
But in terms of government programs, both the Congress and the Department of Energy have been struggling with CCS for quite some time. DOE's FutureGen, a public-private partnership program announced in 2003 to build a commercial-scale CCS power plant in Illinois, was cancelled in January.
There are some Congressional proposals to incentivize CCS, including one from House Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA-9) that collects fees from electricity consumers and creates a corporation to dispense these monies for commercial development of CCS.
CMU EPP professor Edward Rubin actually testified in front of Rep. Boucher's committee this past summer about this CCS bill.
I have spent the last several weeks researching CCS technologies and the various methods of carbon capture and sequestration in an EPP Engineering course taught by Edward Rubin at CMU.
Integrated gasification combined cycle plants (IGCC) eliminate 85-90 percent of plant generated GHG emissions from the atmosphere. The process converts the coal to synthetic gas. However, there are currently only 4 IGCC pants in operation in the US due to the high capital costs.
Sequestration methods pump liquified CO2 emissions deep into the ground into saline aquifers, old coal beds, and/or dry oil and gas wells beneath impermeable caprock. The captured CO2 remains beneath the surface in liquid form.
The power utility sector is notorious for its late adopter attitude regarding innovative new technologies, especially cost intensive developments that have the potential to diminish traditional power generation efficiencies.
One need only look at the carbon map provided by CARMA.org to see that this attitude must change.
I have to take issue with the idea that CO2 is unclean. CO2 is not a pollutant. It is about, but not quite 400 part per million in our atmosphere. Plants take in CO2 and over time CO2 will be sequestered naturally. Remember that the definition of 'dirty' or air pollution is that it is bad for either plants in that it kills plants or bad for animals to breath.
It is fine to talk about sequestering CO2 to try to prevent global warming, but let us please be honest with the terms. CO2 is not pollution, in the classic sense of the word.
Doug Bauman,
CMU EE 80
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