Ken Silverstein EnergyBiz Insider Editor-in-Chief

Beyond eliminating all the toxins that come out of the plant, the so-called FutureGen would capture -- and bury -- the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions thought to cause global warming. To boot: the facility would be at least 60 percent efficient, or the amount of coal put into the furnace that is ultimately converted to electricity -- a good bit more than a typical plant that is 35 percent efficient.

FutureGen has been on the drawing board for three years. But just recently, the Department of Energy asked the FutureGen Industrial Alliance member companies to propose sites. Roughly 22 are now on the table in this country. At least nine states are in the running to attract this would-be facility.

David Garmen, undersecretary in the Energy Department and who spoke in Charleston, W.V., says that the list will narrow to a half dozen this summer. Then, environmental impact statements will be taken and a final selection will take place in 2008. The goal is then to get the plant up and running by 2012. The best possible places to build would be those places that have ample infrastructure that includes rails, gas pipelines and ports.

"We mine 2.8 billion tons of coal each day," says Garmen. "If we didn't, we would have to double our gas production and this is not feasible. We need to develop affordable energy in ways that don't harm the environment." Coal makes up about 51 percent of the electricity generation in the United States. About 250 years worth of reserves are in the ground and it's relatively cheap when compared to natural gas or oil.

FutureGen will cost about $962 million. Of that, the coal industry will pony up $250 million while foreign governments -- China, India and Korea are all involved -- will contribute $80 million. The U.S. government will cover the roughly $700 million balance. The initial plant would generate 275 megawatts of electricity.

Specifically, FutureGen would use integrated gasification combined cycle technology, called coal gasification. That converts coal to a vapor before the toxins are filtered out and the CO2 would be separated from the hydrogen and then captured. The hydrogen would be used to produce transportation fuel.

Zero Emissions

The FutureGen Industrial Alliance is a coalition representing some of the world's largest coal companies and electric utilities that are partnering with the Energy Department to design, build and operate the plant. They include American Electric Power and Southern Co. as well as Peabody Energy and Consol Energy. Meanwhile, the China Huaneng Group, the largest energy company in China, has joined the group.

If all goes well, FutureGen would be a start. And more would get built. Until that point, the pressure is on to cut all pollutants that leave the smokestack as well as to find ways to capture and bury CO2 emissions. Even the biggest skeptics of the validity of global warming recognize that it is an issue that is not going to evaporate. It's here -- and the drumbeat for a carbon constrained world is going to get louder and particularly as new technologies come to the fore that make "zero emissions" possible, as well as carbon sequestration.

"In the next 5 to 10 years, the United States will do something about CO2 and this is about how long it will take to get the technology going," says Paul Grimmer, president of Eltron Research in Boulder, Co. that is working with the U.S. Department of Energy on carbon sequestration. The technology is most applicable in coal-fired plants, he says, which emit 3.5 times the amount of CO2 than gas-fired plants.

Along those lines, older coal-fired facilities could be retrofitted so as to trap the CO2 before it leaves the smokestack. But such remedies are expensive and less efficient than building coal gasification plants. That's why the Energy Act of 2005 would allow up to $800 million in tax credits to apply advanced coal gasification technologies.

But the high price of natural gas has forced more utilities to examine coal generation more closely. In fact, 129 such plants are now on the drawing board in the United States alone and only a few of those are coal gasification plants. While those modern facilities are twice as efficient as conventional coal plants, they cost about 20 percent more. If carbon sequestration tools are built into them, the tab is even bigger.

Environmental Community

While the environmental community champions advances in technology that include FutureGen and coal gasification, it is skeptical. Any progress would be mitigated, it adds, if CO2 capture is not included. And the ultimate answer is to increase the reliance on sustainable energy forms such as wind and solar while slowly withdrawing from the fossil fuel addiction.

"What we are doing is in no way fast enough or large enough," says David Hawkins, director of the Climate Center at the National Resource Defense Council, in an interview with Knight Ridder newspapers. "It's like calling for a 20-year research program on improved fire-fighting techniques when the house is on fire."

But, better late than never -- to use another overused phrase. The voluntary efforts of certain manufacturers and utilities to cut all their emissions in combination with government programs that include FutureGen and clean coal research and development will have a noticeable effect. "One of the oldest forms of energy -- coal -- is also becoming one of the most high tech," says Garmen with the Energy Department.

Disagreement does exist as to the best way to achieve cuts in emissions levels. The technology to do so exists but it is also expensive and might add a good chunk to the cost of producing power. But what's the alternative? And that's where common ground can be found. And, it's why FutureGen and the U.S. government are striving to bring about changes that would allow us all to breathe a sigh of relief.

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