Coal Gasification : A PRB Overview

1
Coal Gasification A PRB Overview

• Mark Davies Kennecott Energy

• Outline
• Background Our Interest
• History Development of IGCC
• Current status Commercial Technology
• Poly generation - Synthetic Fuels
• Issues for PRB
• The Future
• Questions ???

2
Our Interest - Sustainable Development

• development that meets the needs of the present
  generation without undermining the capacity of
  future generations to meet their needs.

Rio Tintos commitment to SD Ensure our
businesses,operations and products contribute to
the global transition to sustainable development
Coals Sustainability Challenge

• Economic and social criteria make a compelling
  case for coal the issue is environmental
  performance
• Climate change concerns present a complex
  challenge for the continuing use of fossil fuels
  and coal in particular

3
Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC)
IGCC is essentially ready for use by the coal
industry, which has largely been spared the
expense of its development

• Twenty years ago oil refinery practice in North
  America and Europe underwent a fundamental change
  as available crude became heavier
• This had two implications
• A significant increase in hydrogen demand to
  'sweeten' the heavier crude and
• Increased production of highly contaminated
  petcoke and heavy refinery residues
• Simultaneously, aerospace technology was being
  applied to the utility sector to create natural
  gas fired turbines and coal based IGCC started
  becoming a viable technology

Implication Current commercial technologies
were developed for Petcoke
4
Natural Gas Combined Cycle (NGCC)

• Natural gas
• Gas turbine
• Heat recovery steam generator
• Steam turbine
• High efficiency
• Low capital
• Simple vs. PC plants
• Cookie-cutter design
• Low emissions

5
Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC)
Gasification is essentially partial oxidation
under pressure
6
IGCC Carbon Capture and Storage
7
Current Commercial Technology
Shell
GE (Chevron Texaco)
ConocoPhillips (E-Gas)

• Lock hopper feed
• Water cooled
• Syngas cooler
• PRB capable at cost

• Slurry feed
• Refectory lined
• Quench available
• Not PRB capable

• Slurry feed
• Refectory lined
• 2 Stage
• ???

8
Impact of Coal Type

• Any coal or biomass feedstock can be gasified
• The issue is the economics! 
• Gasification is most efficient with low moisture,
  low ash and high heating value feedstock's

Source EPRI
9
Issues for PRB

• Capital cost disadvantage may be mitigated by
  fuel cost
• Petcoke/PRB blends can be attractive
• New technology
• DOE/Southern Transport Reactor
• Alternate slurry technology
• Commercial vendors have little ongoing
  development

10
Polygeneration

• Syngas is a prime petrochemical feedstock
• Traditionally produced by reforming natural gas
• Natural gas from Syngas
• Methane reformer
• CO 2H2 Catalyst gt CH4 clean up
• Liquid chemicals from Syngas
• Clean diesels
• Methanol
• Indicative breakeven currenttechnology
• Liquid Fuels 30 - 35 bbl
• Synthetic natural gas - 5.50 - 7 /MBTU

Source DOE
11
IGCC CCS Poly generation
12
Barriers to IGCC Commercial Deployment

• Cost ? 10-20 penalty for bituminous coal
• Traditional PC can meet current environmental
  standards
• IGCC financing costs higher than PC perceived
  risk profile
• No reward for risk taking new plants largely
  being built by regulated utilities
• Excess capacity in many regions - NGCC overbuild
• IGCC needs more project development than NGCC or
  PC
• To date no standard IGCC design - this will
  change with GE entry
• Lack of familiarity with IGCC in the power
  industry (it is a chemical plant)

13
Future Issues

• Environmental regulation, community pressure,
  uncertainty particularly carbon
• Sustained Federal research effort to resolve
  cost, reliability concerns
• Especially on low-rank coals
• Critical to establish viability and acceptability
  of carbon capture and storage
• e.g. FutureGen
• Development of of integrated, optimized designs
• GE/Bechtel
• ConocoPhillips/Fluor
• Deployment incentives to overcome commercial
  penalty (e.g. incentives, production tax credits,
  etc)
• Costs should come down as new plants are built
  and improved designs become standard