Coal gasification plant blows cost predictions out of the water

[kristopher]

This is the same plant they wanted to build in Delaware that was defeated by offshore wind in the vetting process. All the predictions about underestimated costs and greenwashing that were made at that time by independent analysts are proving true.



Duke: New Indiana coal plant's cost up to $2.9B

By RICK CALLAHAN
Associated Press Writer

Posted: April 16
Updated: April 17

INDIANAPOLIS — Duke Energy said Friday that the cost of a coal-gasification power plant it is building in southwestern Indiana has risen to nearly $2.9 billion, or about twice the original estimate. The details are part of Duke's filing asking the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to allow it to pass on the plant's additional costs to its customers. If regulators agree, it will boost the project's overall rate impact on Duke's average Indiana customer 3 percent to 19 percent. The increase would be fully phased in by 2013.

The plant's estimated cost has grown steadily since it was announced in 2007, when Duke said the project likely would cost between $1.3 billion and $1.6 billion.

...Duke spokeswoman Angeline Protogere said while there's no guarantee the cost won't go higher, the company is "confident" it can be completed for about the revised estimate.

...When it goes online as projected in 2012 it will release an estimated 4 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.

Kerwin Olson, the program director for the Citizens Action Coalition of Indiana, said he expects the project's final cost to top $3 billion. But he said the price tag could grow even more if Congress acts to impose caps on carbon dioxide emissions linked to global warming. If that happens and Duke decides to adapt the plant to capture some of its carbon dioxide, he said the project's price would spiral higher....

More at: http://www.wral.com/news/state/story/7433034/

So they are hoping to pass cost overruns on to the ratepayers and at $3B potential cost the plant will not actually capture or sequester carbon.

Cost overruns are a part of life in projects of this size and complexity.

[AlecBGreen]

1. ok check my math

per http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/co2_report/co2report.html#table_1 and http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epa/epa_sum.html

"The national average output rate for coal-fired electricity generation was 2.095 pounds CO2 per kilowatthour in 1999"

The proposed coal-gasification power plant is rated at 620 MW.

620 mW * 1,000 kW/mW = 620,000 kW

620,000 kW * 365 * 24 = 5 475 000 000 kWh

(4,000,000 tons * 2,000 pounds/ton) / 5,475,000,000 kWh = 1.46 pounds CO2 per kWh.

That is assuming 100% efficiency. EIA says national average is 72.2%

Is this right?

[madokie]

2. Sounds about right for what I've been reading for gasifiers in general

We should have been using a gasifier instead of direct burn like the coal plants we have now do it. Gasify the coal burn it in a combined cycle power plant for a substantial drop in co2 produced for the same amount of energy output.

[joshcryer]

3. Coal gasification used to be huge in the early industrial age.

Lots of accidents, though.

[kristopher]

4. Do you mean right as in "is the arithmetic right"?

Looks right.

Right as in, "is that the amount of CO2 a IG coal plant produces? Possibly not, there are too many unknowns to have any confidence in the final number.

IIRC the hoped for performance for the technology in general is that it will be more efficient than traditional coal and CO2e emissions reductions would basically be proportional to the boost in performance. I think the goal is going from about 30% efficiency for most coal plants to about 45% efficiency with gasification and maybe busting 50% by incorporating a combined cycle design (IGCC).

The claim is that it would also produce an easy to capture concentrated stream of CO2.


I would not endorse the technology for a number of reasons.

[madokie]

6. What would those reasons be if you would please?

IIRC gasifiers produce somewhere in the 60% range of less co2 for the same energy output plus that easier to capture co2 stream that it does produce. I've been building, basically a gasifier, heating stoves for 30 plus years now but I have to admit that I haven't taken one to have it checked in a lab for how much co2 is produced. I do know that with heating with wood in a conventional stove one of the worst nightmares you can have is a chimney fire which is caused when the creosote, which is due to incomplete burning btw, builds up in the flue then becomes ignited. My stove design creates no creosote in the flue gases to ever accumulate to ever catch fire. For that alone I can see how much more efficient the stoves are. Once the fire is lit you will never see a bit of smoke which is a sign of incomplete combustion, ie creosote creating, come from any of the chimneys of the stoves I build no matter how low you need the fire to be. With a big robust fire creosote is never a problem as you're adding enough air for a complete burn. Thats what the coal companies do with their present choice of burn design. Our present coal plants should be converted to using a gasifier for the reasons I've stated here on many occasions. A gasifier produces more than 50% less co2 for the same amount of energy so if nothing else is done it would help to buy time as we get more solar and wind online. The basic infrastructure for this is already there so the cost compared to building a complete new plant would be small as all needs to be changed is the way the burn chamber is designed. But go ahead and tell me I'm nuts, I'm used to it, as I've been told that many times here when I've tried to get discussions started on using gasifiers before. All I've gotten before in discussion is Ah you can't do that madokie you're full of shit etc. so fuck it have it your way. :hi:

[kristopher]

7. You aren't wrong in the narrow view.

We could reduce carbon emissions by increasing the efficiency of coal plants. But as you can see by the OP, the technology isn't simple, it isn't cheap, and it isn't likely to be able to be retrofitted to old plants. So it is really just a matter of making critical choices from the available options.

In addition to that, there is the more general argument that hinges on an overall way of thinking about solutions to climate change and energy security - coal is the bad guy, and we need to pursue a direction that leaves it behind.

[Statistical]

8. I tnink you are confusing efficiency with capacity factor.

That is assuming 100% efficiency. EIA says national average is 72.2%
The 72% is capacity factor of existing coal plants. Capacity factor has nothing to do with efficiency. Thermal Efficiecny of most coal plants ranges from 30% to 35%. Thermal efficiency is the conversion of heat into electricity. 30% Thermal efficiency means 1 unit of heat produce 0.3 units of electricity.

Capacity factor is simply a measure of how much power the plant produces in a year.
1 GW * 24 * 365 * 100% = 8760 GWh annually.
A 1 GW plant with capacity factor of 100% would produce 8760GWh annually. The same plant with 50% capacity factor would produce half that. Capacity factor is measure of actual power produced / theoretical power.

1 ton of coal burned will always produce the same amount of CO2 (assuming it is the same coal). The only way to reduce CO2 from a coal plant is to make the thermal efficiency higher. 1 ton of coal in a 30% efficient plant will produce same amount of CO2 as 1 ton burned in a 45% efficient plant. The only difference is the 45% efficient plant produces more energy for the same amount of fuel (and thus CO2).

[Nihil]

5. And yet again ...

>> If that happens and Duke decides to adapt the plant to capture some of
>> its carbon dioxide, he said the project's price would spiral higher....
>
> So they are hoping to pass cost overruns on to the ratepayers and at
> $3B potential cost the plant will not actually capture or sequester carbon.

Even if *they* *decide* to capture *some* of the CO2, there is NOTHING about
the sequestering aspect that even falls into the category of "credible fiction".

"CCS" is a fraud - expensive both in money and to the planet.

:grr:

[gasifier geek]

9. We need to start thinking on a smaller scale

If we start implementing distributed generation, we could save a lot of fuel. It is estimated that only 30% of the energy generated actually reaches your light bulb. The reduction of transmission lines, and generating on a small scale is the key. Small scale gasifiers exist, learn more at: http://www.evingerinc.com/?Click=1