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Feds to Pennsylvania Coal Company: No More $$ For Clean Coal Project

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Back in January 2008, the "clean coal" schemers and dreamers had a rude awakening when the US government "restructured" a $1.8 billion project known as FutureGen. The funding was intended for small-scale testing of the viability of capturing and sequestering carbon emissions from coal plants. The Feds basically decided that "clean coal" was too expensive and risky to fund.

Consol Energy Incorporated, a Pittsburgh-area coal company, has just been dealt the dreaded federal blow themselves.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review has the story:

A Pittsburgh-area coal company helping to build a power plant that stores its pollution deep underground might have to wait for the next president to decide whether the project remains buried.

Consol Energy Inc. has spent about half a million dollars on FutureGen, a project begun by President Bush in 2003 to build an experimental coal-burning plant with "near zero" greenhouse gas emissions.

The project has been stymied since January, when the Department of Energy, which was to provide 74 percent of the money, pulled out because of ballooning costs.

Consol has had their hearts set on completing a CCS-equipped plant in Matoon, Illinois:

Slated for construction in central Illinois, the 275-megawatt facility would turn coal into a gas to fuel turbines, rather than burning coal powder. Carbon dioxide extracted from the process would be injected thousands of feet into the earth.

Originally budgeted at just under $1 billion, the Mattoon, Ill., plant's projected price tag is now $1.8 billion because of rising construction costs. Energy officials say that instead of building an experimental power plant and the environmental technology to go with it, the FutureGen money would be better spent testing only the carbon storage.

The Senate Appropriations Committee:

... [has] voted to protect $134 million of previously appropriated funding for FutureGen until the next administration. The Energy and Water Appropriations bill passed by a bipartisan group of senators also includes language prohibiting the Department of Energy from using the funds for its new restructured clean coal program.

The problem for the "clean coal" folks (and the politicians interested in the Mattoon plant) is that the $134 million does not include the cash for building the plant; it's just for CCS projects. Grist explains:

The Department of Energy released new requirements for funding under its new approach to FutureGen. Rather than pushing all the funds into a single "zero-emissions" plant in Illinois, DOE announced several months ago that the department will instead concentrate on carbon capture and sequestration components for multiple commercial power plants. Under threat of subpoena, DOE also handed over ($ub req'd) documents to the House Science and Technology Committee's Investigations and Oversight panel on its decision to yank funding for FutureGen. Meanwhile, Congress is still trying to insert funding for FutureGen into other appropriations.

Or, as the "clean coal" front group folks are saying, "the feds cheated us" - with an ample dose of spin, of course.

Finally, let's go back to the Tribune-Review article, for an explanation of the presidential politics involved, and the resulting uncertainty. McCain, or Obama? Who will do what when they're elected? McCain equivocates; Obama speaks up clearly for his state:

Both major presidential candidates say they want billions more in federal spending on clean coal research.

Sen. John McCain visited with Consol officials here this month. In an e-mail to the Tribune-Review, a McCain spokesman said the Arizona Republican supports "projects like FutureGen" but said its cost is a "legitimate concern that must be addressed."

Democrat Sen. Barack Obama has been more explicit in supporting the proposed plant in his home state. Obama joined several Illinois politicians who signed a letter [link] to the Department of Energy, accusing it of shutting down the project after the industry consortium picked Mattoon over a site in Bush's home state of Texas.

Cutting the project money is "just another example of (the Bush administration's) failure to address global warming and the energy crisis," an Obama spokesman said in an e-mail.

A note to the future US president: as we have said over and over and over again, CCS and the whole "clean coal" concept is not feasible within the time frame needed to curb catastrophic global warming. The US government's scaling-back of FutureGen due to costs should send a message to the "clean coal" lobby.

Instead, the lobby's frustration could lead them elsewhere:

"If the United States chooses not to make the necessary investments (in clean coal research), I think other countries ... will make the investments, and then there's the potential that the U.S. will not be exporting the technology, but importing it," [Consol representative] Winberg said.

Because if the G-8 says it's a good idea, then it must be!

Sorry, Mr. Winberg, but it's not.

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