Clean-coal power plant to break ground in Texas
The Texas Clean Energy Project, a $2.5 billion coal gasification power plant, will be the first US power plant that combines both integrated coal gasification combined cycle and carbon-capture-and-storage technologies, Tracey writes.
The Texas Clean Energy Project, a $2.5 billion coal gasification power plant, will be the first US power plant that combines both integrated coal gasification combined cycle and carbon-capture-and-storage technologies, Tracey writes.
In a recent Op-Ed in the聽New York Times, author Joe Nocera talks about 鈥淎 Real Carbon Solution鈥� in Odessa, Tex. as聽the聽Summit Power Group聽plans to break ground on a $2.5 billion聽coal gasification聽power plant. Summit has named it the聽Texas Clean Energy Project聽(TCEP).
TCEP is a 鈥淣owGen鈥� Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) facility that will incorporate carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology in a聽first-of-its-kind聽commercial聽clean coal power plant.
TCEP will be a 400MW power/poly-gen plant that will also produce urea for the U.S. fertilizer market and capture 90 percent of its carbon dioxide (CO2) 鈥� approximately 3 million tons per year 鈥� which will be used for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) in the West Texas Permian Basin.
According to Nocera, 鈥淧art of the promise of this power plant is its use of gasified coal; because the gasification process doesn鈥檛 burn the coal, it makes for far cleaner energy than a traditional coal-fired聽plant.鈥�
鈥淏ut another reason this plant 鈥� and a handful of similar plants 鈥� has such enormous potential is that it will capture some 90 percent of the facility鈥檚 already reduced carbon emissions. Some of those carbon聽emissions will be used to make fertilizer. The rest will be sold to the oil industry,which will push it into the ground, as part of a process called聽enhanced oil recovery.鈥�
TCEP received a $450MM award in 2010 from the U.S. Department of Energy鈥檚 Clean Coal聽Power Initiative. TCEP received its final air quality permit from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality on December 28, 2010.
The Texas Clean Energy project will be the first United States based power plant that combines both Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle and carbon capture and storage technologies.