 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Prepared Witness Testimony The House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Future Options for Generation of Electricity from Coal.
Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality
Mr. Dick Olliver
Mr. Chairman. Global Energy is pleased to have the opportunity to testify on the important topic of "Future Options for Generation of Electricity from Coal." Global Energy is an independent international energy company with a primary strategy of utilizing gasification technology in the development of its own power generation projects, or licensing our proprietary gasification technology to others. We are the owner and licensor of E-GAST Gasification Technology, originally developed by Dow Chemical. Additionally, we own and operate the Wabash River Ltd. gasification facility in Terre Haute, Indiana, which since 1995 has gasified high sulfur coal and petroleum coke using the E-GAST process, providing synthesis gas and steam to our neighbor utility, Cinergy, for the net production of 262 MW electricity. Of significance to this hearing, Wabash River Energy is the cleanest coal-fired power plant in the world. Global Energy is a member of the Gasification Technologies Council (GTC), the pre-eminent trade association of the gasification industry. I currently serve as 2 a member of the Board of Directors of the GTC, and recently served as Chairman of the organization. The GTC members provide technologies for gasification, industrial gas supply, gas cleanup and conditioning, sulfur recovery, power generation and others, as well as equipment and technical services. These components form the core of "industry know-how" of current and future gasification-based power, fuels, and chemical plants in the U.S. and around the world. Reflecting again on the Wabash River gasification facility, I request that the comments of my Global Energy colleague, Mr. Phil Amick, be included with my written statement for this hearing. Wabash River is a repowering of a 1953 vintage pulverized coal plant, one that was operating on compliance coal, and had precipitators but was unscrubbed. Compared to the performance prior to the repowering, based on 1990 data for the older plant, the new facility makes almost six times as many megawatt hours of electrical power, yet reduces emissions of SOX by over 5500 tons per year, NOX by 1180 tons per year, and PM-10 particulates by 100 tons per year. It produces 20% less CO2 per megawatt of production because it is 20% more efficient than the original plant. Mercury removal is about 50%, through the cleanup processes for other pollutants. An IGCC facility can be designed for up to 95% mercury removal. The Wabash River facility, and the Tampa Electric Polk Power Station in Florida, are the first of a new class of coal-based electrical generation plants with superior environmental performance compared to other technologies such as 3 pulverized coal and fluidized bed boilers. Wabash River has been operating since 1995 with emissions lower than coal-based power plants that are now being permitted for operation in 2005. Accordingly, it is our strong belief, pertinent to the subject of this hearing, that Coal Gasification is ready today, as a clear and worthy option for power generation in North America. E-GAST and other prominent coal gasification technologies described here today, have already been successfully demonstrated in power generation modes, as well as for commercial production of chemicals, and are ready to be implemented in the next round of power plant capital expansion. In preparation for this hearing, I reviewed the public record of other hearings held by your committee relative to today's topic. We commend the Energy and Commerce Committee and this sub-committee on their vision and initiatives to highlight and increase public awareness of the important related topics including Comprehensive National Energy Policy, The Hydrogen Economy, and Natural Gas Supply and Demand Issues. In that regard, it bears repeating today excerpts from the statement made before this Committee on March 14, 2001 by Richard Abdoo of Wisconsin Energy, outlining four basic principles of energy policy for power generation: · A balance of economic, environmental and energy supply goals · A need for fuel diversity 4 · A commitment to long-term solutions · An emphasis on domestic resources-particularly coal These observations are perhaps more obvious and more important today as the problems of energy supply have in fact become more acute, presenting immediate and serious threats to our economy and national security. To amplify this point, I request that a copy of the article in The Wall Street Journal of June 18, 2003, titled "Gas Prices Rock Chemical Industry", be included with my written statement for this hearing. One of the current concerns discussed by this committee on June 10, 2003, highlighted Natural Gas Supply and Demand Issues. On that occasion, the Honorable Alan Greenspan described today's reality in the U.S. of tight supplies of natural gas along with sharply rising prices, and identified new capacity of imported LNG as a promising mechanism for "creating a price-pressure safety valve" and improved "widespread natural gas avail- ability in North America". While we agree that LNG is indeed one viable and worthy option to the "natural gas supply issue", we strongly suggest that Coal Gasification be added to the list of viable and worthy solutions. It is noteworthy, that Coal Gasification is in a state of commercial readiness today in this time of obvious need, thanks to the vision, commitment and support of the U.S. Congress and the Department of Energy (DOE), initiating and implementing valuable programs including Clean Coal Technology, Vision 21, 5 Clean Coal Power Initiative, and many others, along with the enthusiastic participation of private industry and public utility entities. Accordingly, we whole-heartedly commend and extend continued support for the DOE programs aimed at furthering and improving the use of Coal Gasification for power generation, and consistent with DOE Vision 21, for co-production of chemicals and other useful commercial by-products. Specifically on the topic of FutureGen, we commend the DOE for proposing this bold initiative which recognizes that Coal Gasification must provide the technological foundation for the U.S. power generation industry, if coal is to have a long-term future in this arena. Furthermore, I request that the comments recently submitted by the GTC on the proposed FutureGen project be included with my written statement for this hearing. This concludes my remarks. I thank you for the opportunity to appear before this Committee and would be pleased to answer questions. Richard A. Olliver
Statement of Phil Amick Vice President, Commercial Development Global Energy, Inc. Before a Hearing of The Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality Of the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the U.S. House of Representatives June 24, 2003 My name is Phil Amick and I am Vice President, Commercial Development for Global Energy Inc., headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. I would like to thank the Chairman and the other members of the Subcommittee for allowing me to submit this statement for this hearing. Global Energy owns and operates the Wabash River Energy Ltd. gasification facility in Terre Haute, Indiana. The affiliated power generation plant is owned and operated by Cinergy. This 262 MW facility powers about 250,000 homes while utilizing local high sulfur coals, and even petroleum coke feedstocks, with sulfur content of 5.5% and more. More to the point for this hearing, it is the cleanest coal fired power plant in the world, of any technology. The Wabash River IGCC is a repowering of a 1953 vintage pulverized coal plant, one that was operating on compliance coal and had precipitators but was unscrubbed. Compared to the performance prior to repowering, based on 1990 data for the older plant, the new facility makes almost six times as many megawatt hours of electrical power yet has reduced emissions of SO x by over 5500 tons per year, NO x by 1180 tons per year and PM-10 particulates by 100 tons per year. The Wabash facility, and the Tampa Electric Polk Power Station in Florida, are the first of a new class of coal-based electrical generation facilities with superior environmental performance compared to other technologies such as pulverized coal and fluidized bed. Wabash has been operating since 1995 with emissions lower than coal plants that are now being permitted for operation in 2005. Wabash is a power plant using high sulfur coal that has SO2 emissions as low as one fortieth of the Clean Air Act Year 2000 standard. Sulfur is chemically extracted from the syngas and sold for use in the fertilizer industry, about a railcar per day of pure sulfur that used to go into the atmosphere. It's a coal power plant where the coal ash products emerge as a vitrified black sand byproduct and are marketed as construction material. There are no solid wastes from the coal gasification process - no scrubber sludge, fly ash or bottom ash. In this plant, the wastewater stream from the chemical process meets current National Drinking Water Standards. Carbon dioxide emissions are 20% lower than conventional unscrubbed coal fired plants because of the inherent efficiency of the gasification combined cycle process. The plant, with no additional special equipment, also has a mercury removal rate of about 50%. One of the keys to this superior environmental performance is the fact that the gasification process takes place at high pressure. This facilitates the chemical processes that remove the pollutants. High pressure operation also will facilitate additional carbon reduction and mercury removal measures on future plants. Department of Energy and industry studies indicate that significant reductions can be achieved with much less cost and performance impact than possible with coal combustion technologies that operate near atmospheric pressure. While carbon dioxide emissions already 20% less than conventional units, this emission can be reduced more than 75% by shifting the syngas to hydrogen. This technology, already in use at some hydrogen production facilities, can be retrofit to a gasification facility for as little as 2 % of the original capital cost. The plant output reduction for this additional process step is a fraction of what would be seen in a conventional technology plant. In a gasification facility, it can be retrofit at any time in the future. Mercury removal is also much simpler in the gasification process. A plant like the Wabash River facility could be upgraded to 80% or better mercury removal by the addition of a single carbon bed vessel, at a cost of less than $1 million dollars. Other facilities, such as the Tennessee Eastman gasification plant for chemical feedstock production in Kingsport, Tennessee, achieve better than 90% mercury removal to meet their process constraints, and have been doing it for nearly two decades. Gasification technology for coal based power generation is being commercially marketed by ourselves and others. We feel that it is the most environmentally friendly solution for diversifying the fuel mix of new electrical power plant capacity. Through repowering, much of the existing, aging coal generation base can be upgraded as well, as was done at Wabash River. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, that concludes my oral statement. With your permission, I have additional materials that can be included in the record.
|
|||||||||||
|
