in the AFR today:How we can keep burning (clean) coal for 100...

in the AFR today:
How we can keep burning (clean) coal for 100 years

The American engineer helping Australian coalminers prepare for a low carbon future has good news for his donors Down Under.

“It will work for coal,” says Jeremy Fetvedt,during a conversation with the Tech Zero podcast about his work on a low carbon, coal-fired power station that bears his name.

Mr Fetvedt was a key player in the NetPower jointventure which last year delivered electricity into the Texas power grid from a pioneering gas fired power station that is said to capture more than 97 per cent of the carbon dioxide emitted during combustion.

He is now working to adapt the power station to runon coal – a project partly funded by Australian coal miners – in the beliefthat even the most unfashionable fossil fuel can be made clean.

Dubbed the Allam-Fetvedt cycle after its two mainfounders – Rodney Allam and Mr Fetvedt – the project spent last year burningmethane gas in pure oxygen and ultimately produced a highly concentrated streamof carbon dioxide within a closed loop that would be suitable for permanentstorage or industrial use.

By contrast, the carbon dioxide emitted bytraditional gas power stations is often mixed with nitrous oxide, sulfurdioxide and other particulates, meaning further time, money and energy isrequired to separate carbon dioxide from those flue gases before it can bepermanently stored.

Australian coal miners were so impressed by the gastrial, they pledged $US5 million to Mr Fetvedt’s team in 2020 to fund an adaption of the Texas gas power station to run on coal.

Jeremy Fetvedt, the American engineer helpingAustralian coal miners prepare for a low carbon future.

The money was invested via the Australian coalindustry’s research and development organisation Low Emissions TechnologyAustralia (LETA), which was previously called Coal21.

Mr Fetvedt told the Tech Zero podcastthat adapting the Allam-Fetvedt cycle to run on coal was relatively simple,requiring the mere addition of a device that first heats the coal and producesa synthesis gas (syngas) which can be fed into the existing power station.

While the coal trial is only half complete, MrFetvedt said he was confident there were no major technical barriers.

“It’s a very well known, understood process, togasify coal and just take the syngas into the second process,” he said.

“Some of the lead times for the equipment involveddo border on years, so it’s another year or so on project.”

A solution for ‘hundreds of years’

Asked whether the Allam-Fetvedt cycle was a“transition technology” that would only be viable for a short time beforerenewables and storage took over, Mr Fetvedt said he believed the technologywould pass the test of time.

“I personally think it’ll be a solution that’ll berunning for hundreds of years,” he said.

The Allam-Fetvedt cycle does not provide a carbonstorage solution; Mr Fetvedt says that is up to the customer to solve anddifferent locations will suit different storage solutions or uses.

“It depends upon where you are and where the localindustry is, what the local geology is, what the local experience is,” he said.

LETA has called for an Allam-Fetvedt cycle powerstation to be built above geological storage locations in Queensland andbelieves the technology could also be used to make hydrogen from coal withoutemissions.

LETA also joined Santos last month in lamenting the Albanese government’s decision to cut $250 million worth of funding for carbon capture and storage projects in last month’s federal budget.

Netpower is a joint venture of Fetvedt’s employer 8Rivers Capital, oil giant Occidental, transmission company Exelon and severalother energy services companies.

While the Texas power station housing the coalstudies is a trial facility, Fetvedt’s employer 8 Rivers Capital has proposedthe construction of permanent Allam-Fetvedt cycle power stations in the USstates of Colorado and Illinois.

Investment decisions on those two projects could betaken before the end of this year.

The coal trial is actually a return to the originalambitions for the Allam-Fetvedt cycle power station; it began as an attempt toproduce clean coal-fired power but was refocused onto gas-fired power in a bidto find a simpler, faster path to market.