Is Clean Coal really dead?
The FutureGen Clean Coal project to retrofit an existing coal plant in Meredosia, IL. It'll capture 90% of the plants CO2 and the other emission will be reduced to "near-zero levels"
Construction to start late 2012 and be completed in 2015.
"Using safe, proven pipeline technology, the CO2 storage facility will receive and store emissions from an Ameren Energy Resources power plant in Meredosia, Ill. that will be repowered with advanced oxy-combustion technology provided by The Babcock & Wilcox Company and Air Liquide Process and Construction, Inc. The FutureGen 2.0 technologies have the potential to repower the world’s fleet of coal-fueled power plants in a manner that largely eliminates their emissions, spurs job creation and substantially advances clean energy technology around the globe."
Its received 1 Billion out of the 1.3 Billion cost from the Department of Energy.
http://www.futuregenalliance.org/
There's also an an existing demo on the AEP Mountaineer plant in WV which has been successfully capturing 1.5% of its CO2 emissions and storing it underground for at least a year now and will get upgraded to commercial scale after the tests are completed.
http://www.aep.com/environmental/climatechange/carboncapture/
Then there's the BP / Rio Tinto company, HydrogenEnergy that will start construction of its plant in 2012.
http://hydrogenenergycalifornia.com/
@Jim M, true its a slow start and companies balk at the price of developing bran new technology. I don't really believe its dead, my question was a bit sarcastic. There are so many on this site who have been trashing CCS. I think as the projects I mentioned above progress the technologies of retrofitting existing coal plants will get cheaper. Also there's no question we can store the CO2 in area that have the geologic rock formations that chemically react with CO2.
@Hey Dook Well yeah they start out with the demo projects probably for both environmental and feasibility reasons. First to show that there are no CO2 leaks from the storage facility and then its the expense of bran new technology. By the way the FutureGen and Hydrogen Energy projects are not demos but commercial scale. I'm not opposed to taxing Carbon emissions but thats a question of whether we can get that passed.
@linlyons Well, I don't think we're going to be able to stop using coal and we certainly won't convince China or India and other developing countries to stop using coal. I don't see why it has to be a lot of energy to capture the CO2 emissions off of the exhaust. You just need the chemicals / amines or even Algae that absorb CO2. All renewable energies are good but we can't ignore the fact of life that we will continue to use coal. I just don't think we will have much of a nuclear revival, it died for a reason and we tend not to go backward but forward.
@George Orwell, 1. could you please provide some proof that there have been CO2 scrubbers on coal plants for year? 2. If its a waste of time why did the Department of Energy just give 1 Billion to the Futuregen Alliance, last August. 3. Your last 2 statements confound each other. You say more CO2 in the air is good and then you go and tell us that CO2 is plant food. Well as far as I knew, plants don't grow in the air. Can you please work on developing plants that float in the air so they can take advantage of all the CO2 in the air? Thank you "Big Brother".
@Noah I am all for renewables and don't care a bit about profits for coal or any other energy company. But there's this thing called practicality. Globally renewables including hydro power provides and average of 23% of our energy. But the fact is and will be that nearly 40% or more comes from coal. Provide the existing coal plants a technology to make it clean and you will have reduced carbon emissions by a huge percentage. We have to be practical here. You have to find a compromise in this situation cause sticking to our ideals is going to be end up just as bad as the deniers cause we would have done nothing useful for our world.
Well I think I will give this one to Jim M. For trying to "Fix the problem" Hey Dook gets second spot and I agree about the entrepreneurial spirit. Development of new technology always leads to new ideas you cold not have thought of before. Coal may be ugly but this isn't really about coal this is about innovation and cleaning up a huge percentage of humanities CO2 emissions. Its time to fix the problem and not get stuck on ideals.
Lynlyons and Noah Wind is less than 3% and Solar less than 1% of US energy. They've been growing quite rapidly but wont make up for the 25% coal usage. Idealism won't work, we have to accept that coal is established and won't go away soon enough. In the mean time learning how to make what we have cleaner is I think, a good thing + we would have the technology to outfit the rest of the worlds coal plants.