2. CARBON CAPTURE: Study calls for billions in coalplant retrofits (06/19/2009)

Saqib Rahim, E&E reporter

As the Energy Department renews its search for the coal plant of tomorrow -- one that can snag carbon dioxide and stuff it underground -- a report out today draws attention to coal plants already standing, already spouting emissions, and far from shutting down soon.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology study says half of U.S. electricity, and about a third of the country's CO2 emissions, comes from coal plants that average 35 years of age. None have the complex equipment needed to efficiently capture CO2, store it, and ship it to someone who can inject it underground -- a process called carbon capture and sequestration, or CCS.

But renovations and retrofits at these plants, the report says, could begin cutting coal emissions long before CCS becomes viable.

"The high-level message, of course, is that we do need a stronger focus on what we're going to do to reduce carbon emissions from the existing plants," professor Ernest Moniz, a lead author of the report, said in an interview. Moniz directs MIT's Energy Initiative, or MITEI.

The report summarized an invitation-only symposium held by MITEI, and funded by utility company Entergy, last March. At the meeting, a small group of experts from power companies, as well as government and universities, considered the options for reducing coal's carbon footprint at existing plants.

These options won't be cosmetic, and they won't be cheap, the report says. For example, a plant could replace its old coal-firing technology with a new, more efficient one, much like fitting a modern, efficient engine into an old car.

Or the plant could choose an even costlier alternative: switching fuels entirely, replacing its coal-burning equipment with new machines that burn biomass or natural gas.

Calls for a national coal plant inventory

But improving the current fleet of coal plants is far from "plug and play," the report acknowledges. While some technologies are easier to attach to an existing plant than others, coal plants are a diverse bunch, and individual circumstances may limit whether an upgrade is possible.

In total, the country has roughly 470 coal-fired power plants. Some plants are more than 60 years old, and others are less than 30. Some are massive, providing a thousand megawatts for entire city sectors, and others are just large enough for a few neighborhoods.

Because of their varied age, said the Electric Power Research Institute's Jeff Brehm, they also vary in efficiency. "CCS retrofit is not going to be cost-effective for all of these," he said.

Even elbow room may be a consideration for some. Brehm said a typical 500-megawatt plant needs about 6 acres for the equipment that captures and compresses CO2. "Many power plants don't have extra space sitting around," he said.

A national inventory of coal plants, the report said, could help by detailing the factors that affect each plant's ability to be retrofitted.

"We don't really know, plant by plant, what is the potential for retrofit," Moniz said. "It clearly can be substantial, but exactly how substantial, we don't know."

Many analysts have said that coal is likely to remain an important fuel in coming decades, even if some countries begin to limit emissions. But since coal is a premier climate culprit, it's been argued that this future must include CCS.

It's 'not going to be cheap'

The argument has largely pointed to developing countries, mainly China, that are rapidly building coal plants as a source of low-cost power and are unlikely to curb emissions without CCS.

Efforts to develop the technology, however, have stalled. While international leaders have called for dozens of demonstration projects that would help scientists and draw investment, only a handful of these projects exist.

In the United States, the campaign to build a high-profile "clean coal" plant has also suffered setbacks. The Bush administration's Energy Department last year pulled the plug on FutureGen, a state-of-the-art coal plant that would inject its emissions underground, citing cost overruns. After a year in limbo as a "restructured" set of smaller projects, it was revived by the Obama administration.

Meanwhile, the coal industry has promoted "CCS-ready" plants it says can attach the equipment if Congress should limit carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector. But some environmental groups, citing the difficulty of retrofits -- and questioning the viability of CCS on the whole -- have mocked the idea by describing their driveways as "Ferrari-ready."

There's less skepticism in the Obama administration. On Tuesday, at a press conference, White House science adviser John Holdren said CCS is "not going to be cheap, but I think it's probably going to work."

"What really remains to be seen is how inexpensive we can make this," he said. "One of the things that remains to be seen is whether we can succeed in approaches that work economically in retrofit, rather than only in new power plants."

Billions in demo projects needed

The MIT report echoed that sentiment, calling for DOE to fund up to $15 billion in demonstration projects for coal retrofits. It also recommended that DOE's current demonstrations include existing plants.

DOE may be receptive, observers said, given the evolution of its coal programs in recent years. A Government Accountability Office report from last September estimated that DOE had spent more than $500 million on gasification -- a high-efficiency coal process like the one in FutureGen -- since 1997.

Meanwhile, its spending on post-combustion capture, a technology that would be valuable for retrofits, enjoyed a slight uptick in 2008 -- to $15 million.