"It isn't only in the U.S. where the environmental implications of coal gasification are a concern. Shenhua's Zhang says the challenge of operating coal-fed facilities in a clean and resource-efficient manner is a top priority for his company. "As long as seven years ago, when I first joined Shenhua and we were planning the first direct liquefaction plant, we challenged ourselves to make a zero-discharge facility," he recalls. "We are very close to zero emissions now."
Shenhua is building its first methanol-to-olefins plant in the inland province of Ningxia, and construction of that project is about one-third completed, Zhang says. Shenhua is building another methanol-to-olefins complex at its coal mines near Baotou in Inner Mongolia that is scheduled to start coming on line at the end of the year. A more advanced, almost completed project is a coal-to-liquid fuels facility that Shenhua is building at its coal mines near the city of Ordos in Inner Mongolia. The plant makes use of a process developed by Shenhua that allows the direct liquefaction of coal into fuels without having to first gasify the coal."
Direct liquefaction might very well minimize the generation of pollutants we have to feed to the algae - presuming you to have seen our earlier dispatches on that topic.