Old King Coal Needs New Energy Team

May 13th, 2011 by Glenn Meyers

Source: World Coal Association

Can the coal industry ever become a partner to the renewable energy industry, searching for the higher good concerning this planet’s energy needs? With enough coal to last for over a century, is there even a need to worry about such matters — at least right now? Will King Coal eventually wither into an old bride’s maid?

On the renewables side of the marriage aisle, we see and hear plenty about all those glistening gems — from all sorts of wind and photovoltaic designs to scores of different biofuels that promise clean, green power, then forward to $19.6 million bets on nuclear fusion by people like Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s billionaire founder who says fusion will be a reality within four years. But in spite of everyone’s best-laid hopes and plans, making renewables the foundation block of the world’s energy supply is not going to happen anytime soon, and certainly not in the next two decades.

In spite of its massive bad press and a spate of lobbyists doing battle, coal remains the world’s energy king by a long shot. The bituminous stuff is meeting a demand that continues to expand, regardless of black lungs, methane leaks, global warming, and the stunning growth of renewables.

To this end, the World Coal Association (WCA) estimates demand for coal will grow 52 percent over the next 20 years, providing access to affordable energy for millions more people.

There is no disputing coal’s importance to the world’s population, providing multiple forms of heat, manufacturing power, and electricity. That the act of burning it imperils our human-friendly planetary system has served to create battlegrounds, not partnerships.

Those who want to eliminate coal from the present and near-future energy mix need to rethink the realities of this world’s energy infrastructure and how long it takes for even small changes to happen. The same can be said for those who argue that climate change is a fabrication. One hundred auditoriums full of climate change naysayers are still going to be hard-pressed to ignore the glaciers and snow covered mountain peaks they have seen vanish in recent years.

The world’s clean energy future requires vision and cooperation among all players, plus a willingness to compromise for the greatest good of all. As fast as new businesses and tools emerge for renewable and clean energy, the infrastructure and supply chain that can support all of that is not yet in place, especially the financial component.

Coal isn’t as cheap as dirt, but the price is right for a world demanding the cheapest energy it can get (in short-term, direct costs). Plus that infrastructure has taken over a century to construct — one that employs millions worldwide and features an extraordinary supply chain of railroads, boats, trucks, roadways, tax bases and financial centers.

What is needed now more than anything is collaboration intended to move the world’s energy infrastructure forward in a way that can address the second half of this century and beyond.

That collaboration has to include the coal industry, too, which is making some strides forward. The WCA reports on its website that over 53 million tons of CO2 are being stored underground, an amount that increases every second. The organization estimates that without carbon capture and storage programs in place, climate change action will cost some $4.7 trillion between 2010 and 2050.

In addition, last October, the European Commission, the Asian Development Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank launched the Global Methane Initiative (GMI) “to urge stronger international action to fight climate change while developing clean energy and stronger economies.”

In the development that new energy infrastructure collaboration like this is timely, and essential. It hastens the building process.

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Tags: Asian Development Bank, European Commission, green energy, Inter-American Development Bank, Jeff Bezos, ne energy infrastructure, World Coal Association

About the Author

Glenn Meyers is a writer, producer, and director. Meyers was editor and site director of Green Building Elements, a contributing writer for CleanTechnica, and is founder of Green Streets MediaTrain, a communications connection and eLearning hub. As an independent producer, he's been involved in the development, production and distribution of television and distance learning programs for both the education industry and corporate sector. He also is an avid gardener and loves sustainable innovation.

Wilmot McCutchen

Does this sound sincere or salesy to you: “The WCA reports on its website that over 53 million tons of CO2 are being stored underground, an amount that increases every second.” Who (name please) wrote this?

Reality check: “Over 53 million” is not much. The EIA projects that by 2035 the CO2 emissions from coal fired power generation in the US will be 2.4 BILLION tons EACH YEAR. And even this paltry 53 million is in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) operations to help oil companies get more oil out of depleted reservoirs. Extrapolating from EOR to deep saline aquifers is what “sequestration” depends on, and CCS depends on sequestration. “Clean coal” needs some serious rethinking.

The lifetime emissions from just one coal plant would require the pore space of a giant oil field. There are just not enough depleted reservoirs to accommodate the CO2 emissions from coal.

The “sequestration” element of “clean coal” has been called by petroleum engineering experts “a profoundly non-feasible option for the management of CO2 emissions.” That’s because depleted reservoirs are like empty tanks, so there is room to squeeze in supercritical CO2 and the flow would be from high to low pressure. But deep saline aquifers (the only place for the requisite pore space for utility-scale CO2 storage) are like full tanks, where the pore space is presently occupied at high pressure by brine that is three times saltier than seawater. That highly saline brine will have to be pumped to the surface to make way for the CO2, and then what do you do with it?

Desalination projects are having trouble disposing of their reverse osmosis reject brine, which is less saline and therefore should be easier. Or is the plan just to hammer billions of tons of supercritical CO2 into the deep saline aquifers and push that highly salty brine elsewhere, possibly polluting the groundwater?
Anonymous

Really?
Anonymous

We haven’t permitted or begun construction on a new coal plant in the US for over two years. It’s unlikely we will build any more coal plants. We’ve been closing existing plants and have scheduled many more for early closure. (We do have a handful under construction that will be completed over the next couple of years, but they won’t offset the closures.)

Europe is getting coal off its grid.

China is building some new coal but concentrating on renewables and hydro.

Indonesia is investing heavily in geothermal.

Japan is turning toward wind, solar and geothermal.

India isn’t talking coal.

The UK is deciding between nuclear and renewables.

“Old” coal is not cheap if one includes hidden costs. “New” coal is as expensive or even more expensive as new nuclear, definitely more expensive if one includes subsidies and hidden costs for both.

Exactly where is the WCA expecting all those new coal plants to get built?