Article

2006-08-22 Science & Technology

(95,000 Barrel/Day) Coal-to-fuel conversion facility

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Posted by ed 2006-08-22 10:35|| || Front Page|| [7 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Uner existing technology these plants a huge producers of CO2. I very much doubt these guys could get this thing built in Washington state. Far more likely these plants will be built near coal supplies in the mountin states or midwest.

Posted by DoDo 2006-08-22 11:46|| 2006-08-22 11:46|| Front Page Top

#2 Just a related trivia... Do you know that shale oil deposits (Colorado/Utah) are calculated as equivalent of all world's oil deposits combined? And that's the lower end estimate.

Economical extraction methods are refined at present.

Posted by twobyfour 2006-08-22 12:08|| 2006-08-22 12:08|| Front Page Top

#3 To be honest, if a bunch of gas stations pumped only Coal-to-Fuel gas and not a cent went to anybody in the Middle East I'd use them exclusively and pay $4 a gallon without a gripe. Perhaps more.

Posted by rjschwarz 2006-08-22 12:13|| 2006-08-22 12:13|| Front Page Top

#4 It costs a little under $1/gallon to produce. Existing pipelines and tankers can transport it. Buy diesel cars (sorry Californicators, you are screwed) and this fuel does not even need to be refined, freeing up tight capacity. In addition diesel engines get 40% more mileage than gas engines so you burn a lot less fuel.

Posted by ed 2006-08-22 12:51|| 2006-08-22 12:51|| Front Page Top

#5 They aren't building it in Washington but in Wellsville, Ohio. My family is from there. It is the living definition of Appalachian poverty. I doubt there are 300 legal jobs there now. It will be built there and they will love it. It will be much better than the WTI industrial waste incinerator or the Lisbon asbestos landfill.

Posted by Nimble Spemble 2006-08-22 13:09|| 2006-08-22 13:09|| Front Page Top

#6 Plant more trees and lawn grass to soak up the CO2 and that problem largely goes away. American Forests Global ReLeaf project will plant trees at US$1/tree. Or the Appalachian strip mines can be treed over, after, for the same result, at about the same cost.

Posted by trailing wife 2006-08-22 13:47|| 2006-08-22 13:47|| Front Page Top

#7 What about underground CO2 storage? Have they figured it out yet?

Posted by Ulereting Greretch1657 2006-08-22 15:39|| 2006-08-22 15:39|| Front Page Top

#8 Between shale oil, coal conversion and other methods we CAN get off the arab oil tit. It will just take foresight and guts to do it. I guess that leaves the government out of it though doesn't it.

Posted by remoteman 2006-08-22 15:47|| 2006-08-22 15:47|| Front Page Top

#9 25 such plants would replace all the 2.4M barrels of oil imports from the Persian Gulf at a capital cost less than $100 billion (and once built the plant will be useful for 40-50 years).

A delightful vision, that.

Without wishing to be too cynical, please do not rely upon any of these changes coming very soon from an executive branch whose predominate source of wealth centers upon petroleum extraction. I refer any of you who doubt this to the amount of Republican (and Democrat) re-election campaign funding donated by Big Oil.

Posted by Zenster 2006-08-22 18:55|| 2006-08-22 18:55|| Front Page Top

#10 Does anyone have a link to a serious economic analysis of this option? I see a reference to the capital costs of building plants, but not to operating costs, transportation costs, whether the process depends on a certain grade of coal (and how much of that grade we have, how easy it is to mine etc.).

I'm not pooh-poohing this article or the idea. I would dearly love to see us remove our economic dependence on oil from places like the Middle East and Venezuela. I'm just curious to see how the full numbers play out and what assumptions have gone into the potential decision to create this pilot plant.

Posted by lotp 2006-08-22 19:02|| 2006-08-22 19:02|| Front Page Top

#11 One other thought -- we have lots of coal, but Europe, a lot less. I wonder if these plants, if widely built, might have the side effect of tightening the Eurabian alliance to keep oil flowing to the continent.

Dont' mind me tonight, folks - I appear to be in a skeptical state of mind about all sorts of things and countries. ;-)

Posted by lotp 2006-08-22 19:04|| 2006-08-22 19:04|| Front Page Top

#12 According to the EIA

Estimates of the world's total recoverable reserves of coal in 2002 were about 1,081 billion sort tons. The resulting ratio of coal reserves to production exceeds 200 years, meaning that at current rates of production (and no change in reserves), coal reserves could in theory last for another two centuries.

The distribution of coal reserves around the world varies notably from that of oil and gas, in that significant reserves are found in the United States and the Former Soviet Union (FSU) but not in the Middle East. The United States with 26 percent and the FSU with 23 percent account for nearly half of global coal reserves. China (12 percent), Australia (8 percent), Germany (7 percent), South Africa (5 percent), and Poland (2 percent) also have significant amounts of the world's recoverable coal reserves.

Posted by Nimble Spemble 2006-08-22 19:27|| 2006-08-22 19:27|| Front Page Top

#13 Thanks, NS. I grew up near coal mining areas, mostly bituminous, some anthracite. Did a brief google and didn't identify what grade coal is needed, but if bituminous is clean enough then yeah, we've got a lot fortunately.

The US military has been trying to get people to invest in this for a while.

Posted by lotp 2006-08-22 19:33|| 2006-08-22 19:33|| Front Page Top

#14 Looks like Bituminous.

The plant, which would take three years to build, would convert high-sulfur coal to liquids, gases and various byproducts, Drake said. The high-sulfur coal is desirable because of its high BTU content. Much of the $3 billion would be spent on scrubber technology to keep the sulfur from combining with rain and forming a dilute sulfuric acid deleterious to forests east of here.

There's not much anthracite outside NE Pennsylvania. Cost of extraction would be a big issue there. This coal will be strip mined, I'm pretty sure.

Posted by Nimble Spemble 2006-08-22 19:56|| 2006-08-22 19:56|| Front Page Top

#15 Yeah, that makes sense. It's been a good long while since my 5th grade project on coal, complete with lumps of each grade and shaded maps. LOL

The house we lived in when I was a young kid was coal heated. You come to appreciate anthracite for hot heat and low emissions. But it's not always the best for other purposes.

Posted by lotp 2006-08-22 20:03|| 2006-08-22 20:03|| Front Page Top

#16 lotp,
Here is one study from a Rentech who is building a CTL plant: The Economic Viability of an FT Facility Coals (1.3MB pdf)

Posted by ed 2006-08-22 20:03|| 2006-08-22 20:03|| Front Page Top

#17 Interesting - thanks. It only shows very high level conclusions, not the real analysis that went into developing the numbers. But a couple points in the slides ed linked to. One is that they are aiming at the DOD market for synthetic diesel and aviation fuel. Not surprising, DOD has been looking for a supplier.

And the other is that a couple issues like water supply factor heavily into the attractiveness (or not) of the plan.

I hope it works.

Posted by lotp 2006-08-22 20:24|| 2006-08-22 20:24|| Front Page Top

#18 That one also did the IRR with oil at $63 per barrel. Pretty generous. Note there's no money on the table.

What is also interesting is these guys are all using the Germans' WWII technology with updates. No real breakthrough.

Posted by Nimble Spemble 2006-08-22 20:45|| 2006-08-22 20:45|| Front Page Top

#19 NS, not sure what you mean by no money left on the table. Page 59 shows the Rate of Return on investment. At $63/barrel:
Barrels/day IRR
10,200..........75%
11,890..........86%
20,400..........95%
23,780.........109%

I think coal is now $7/ton, vs $5/ton. But oil/diesel hasn't been 63/barrel in a while. I dare you to find another (legal) line of business with that kinds of return.

There are other coal gasification tech that has the potential to be cheaper (e.g. molten iron reduction) at the cost of more CO2 produced per barrel.

Posted by ed 2006-08-22 22:31|| 2006-08-22 22:31|| Front Page Top

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