http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/28/science/28COAL.html

U.S. Seeking Cleaner Model of Coal Plant
By ANDREW C. REVKIN

The Energy Department yesterday announced plans to build an 
experimental power plant within 10 years that runs on coal but emits 
no carbon dioxide, the heat-trapping greenhouse gas that makes coal 
plants major contributors to global warming.

The project, called FutureGen, is considered a first step toward 
creating a generation of coal-fueled power plants that emit no 
greenhouse gases and cost no more than 10 percent extra to run, 
department officials said.

The technology is essential, said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, 
if the vast coal reserves in the United States and in many developing 
countries are to be used without adding to the atmosphere's burden of 
greenhouse gases.

Coal-fueled plants now produce about 40 percent of the roughly 23 
billion tons of carbon dioxide humans release into the atmosphere 
each year, and coal is still considered a vital underpinning of 
economic development, here and overseas.

"There is no doubt coal is going to be a principal fuel source in the 
21st century," Mr. Abraham said. The project, he said, "will help 
turn coal from an environmentally challenging energy resource into an 
environmentally benign one."

The $1 billion cost of the pilot project over the next 10 years would 
be shared by the United States, other countries and private 
companies, although no partners have been enlisted, officials said. 
The outlines of the plan were described yesterday in The Wall Street 
Journal.

Mr. Abraham said that the administration would proceed with the 
project with or without international partners, but that it was 
seeking assistance from more than 20 coal-flush countries, including 
Australia and China.

Scientists, environmental groups and power industry officials 
generally lauded the plan, but many said the resulting technology 
would probably not change the status quo unless new emission 
standards forced plant owners to buy new equipment.

President Bush has rejected mandatory restrictions on greenhouse 
gases, calling only for voluntary measures to curb growth in 
emissions unless scientific research reveals clearer environmental 
risks.

"A large-scale demonstration of carbon-capture technology is a good 
idea, but without a requirement to limit carbon emissions the market 
won't use it," said David G. Hawkins, a climate policy expert at the 
Natural Resources Defense Council, a private environmental group.

Under the plan for the pilot power plant, governments would cover as 
much as 80 percent of the cost, and industry would pay the rest. 
Yesterday, officials from several big power companies said that 
committing their share, perhaps $200 million, would be hard, 
particularly with no guarantee that Congress would allocate the 
government's share.

"Companies are skittish about the ability of the federal government 
to deliver on a financial commitment over a long period of time," 
said Dale E. Heydlauff, a senior vice president of American Electric 
Power, an Ohio company that is the largest consumer of coal in the 
Western Hemisphere.

The prototype plant would be somewhat akin to several coal 
"gasification" power plants, which extract less-polluting gases from 
coal instead of burning it and unleashing all manner of emissions.

But the new design would go far beyond existing technologies, 
extracting nonpolluting hydrogen to generate electricity or to power 
fuel cells and pumping the carbon dioxide deep into the earth to 
avoid further buildup of the gas in the atmosphere.

Independent experts said that there were major technical challenges 
to overcome in every aspect of the design but that they were 
surmountable with a sustained effort and money.

The prototype plant would generate about 275 megawatts of 
electricity, or about a fourth of the output of a conventional large 
coal-fueled plant.

The Energy Department did not name a site but said it would probably 
be somewhere near coal reserves and in an area that would allow waste 
gases to be pumped into natural repositories.

Bush administration officials said they would play host to about 20 
countries in June to try to enlist them in the project and other 
efforts to store carbon dioxide underground.


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