Sunday, June 01, 2014

Texas Coal Plant May Be Environmental Game Changer

Construction on a coal-fired power plant equipped with Carbon Capture and Storage technology, or CCS, is expected to be built by 2018 here in Penwell, Texas beside the rail tracks. Proximity to rail will allow CO2 tanks to ferry CO2 throughout Permian Basin where it will injected into the ground to extract crude oil. (Credit: Lorne Matalon / Inside Energy) Click to enlarge.
There are two planned "clean coal" plants in the U.S. that will both sequester harmful CO2 and generate electricity.  One is in Kemper, Mississippi, the other is in west Texas.

Former Dallas mayor Laura Miller heads up the 3.5 billion dollar Texas Clean Energy Project which, despite the name, is all about making electricity from coal.

But not the old way, as Miller explained.

“21st century coal takes coal and puts it in a large receptacle called a gasifier and you add a little pure oxygen and you heat it up to 3000 degrees Fahrenheit and you make a gas out of the lump of coal.”
“By putting it into a gaseous form,” Miller explained,” you’re much more able to pull out the bad stuff including carbon dioxide.”

The technology is called Carbon Capture and Storage, or CCS.

A major Texas utility has agreed to buy captured CO2 from the project to make electricity.  And CO2 will also used to extract oil here in the Permian Basin, the country’s highest producing oilfield.  The captured carbon will be specifically used for enhanced oil recovery.

Texas Coal Plant May Be Environmental Game Changer

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