At the same time as we are dealing with the uncertainty from these and many other pending legislative changes, we are getting further mixed messages from a federal government that appears to support the coal industry in one move, while it changes the rules of the game in another. Just one example will help to explain.
On what initially seems to be a positive news cycle for the industry, Energy Secretary Steven Chu recently announced that $1 billion in stimulus funding was being targeted to restart the stalled FutureGen project.
Readers will remember that the FutureGen project was to build a new, state-of-the-art Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) facility in Mattoon, IL. This facility would have gasified coal to produce synthetic gas, which would then be used to power a combined cycle generation plant. Carbon dioxide from the clean burning process would be captured and stored underground in favorable Illinois geological sinks.
The updated plan – being tagged FutureGen 2.0 in the press – is to retrofit an existing oil-fired plant in Meredosia, IL to an oxy-fuel concept (where coal is combusted in a pure oxygen environment, thus making a pure stream of CO2 for storage). Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) defended the change in plans, noting that FutureGen was to be a “research effort” and since gasification plants are now being built commercially in the U.S., there was no longer any need to test the concept.
Given the nature of the geology under the previously approved Mattoon site, that area will still be needed for the physical sequestration of the CO2, so a pipeline will be built to transfer it from the Meredosia site.
So while many are hailing the FutureGen 2.0 plant as a success and a proactive move toward keeping coal in the mix, some critics are claiming this is a “far cry” from what was originally proposed and see it is a move sideways rather than forward.
With all of the issues listed above, it is easy to wonder what the industry will do to remain vital as it moves through this confusion. That is why this issue of American Coal is focused on “transformation.” We are looking at the proactive moves being proposed and implemented by the industry, and tying them in with the themes being considered at the Coal Market Strategies Conference in Tucson, AZ (October 5 – 7).
In this issue and at Coal Market Strategies, experts from industry, academia, and government will consider “new strategies for new realities.” Changing political realities, rapidly changing domestic and international markets, environmental regulations, myths and misunderstandings about how energy is produced and what it costs, competing fuel sources … all of these issues and more are coming together in a completely unique manner to challenge us to move beyond the “old ways” and to come up with transformative means of providing the affordable, abundant/secure, and environmentally sound energy that this country needs to succeed.
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