African Firms Start to Take Action on Climate Change

 
This article is from India, about our increasingly familiar African friends, Sasol - who are planning/constructing Coal-To-Liquid plants in India, among other places - and some of their efforts to ameliorate the environmental effects of coal use, especially the conversion of it to liquid fuels.
 
The excerpt: 
 
"... Sasol, the world's biggest maker of fuel from coal, is pioneering a plan to sell carbon credits by converting a greenhouse gas into nitrogen and oxygen, also earning it income. Based at two plants in South Africa, the project will convert nitrous oxide and is aimed at cutting emissions equivalent to about 1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year."
 
Sasol does have very assertive efforts underway, and on the way, to tackle CO2 directly, as you will have seen in our other dispatches. In this article, their plans to abate oxides of Nitrogen, also produced by the processes of coal use, is discussed. The importance herein is that, even though CO2 is the most widely demonized by-product of carbon use/combustion, because it is the most voluminous, it is not the only gaseous pollutant, and certainly not the most potent of the "greenhouse" gasses. 
 
Technologies exist, and are being reduced to commercial practice, to recycle, reuse, and profit from, all the by-products of coal use - whether we are burning it for power, or converting it into liquid fuels and chemicals.

Fairbanks Considering a Coal-to-Liquids Plant

 
 
"The Fairbanks Economic Development Council (FEDC) is encouraging local business leaders to consider the benefits of a coal-to-liquid plant.

One significant reduction in energy cost was shown to be the construction of coal/biomass gasifier which would produce syngas. The syngas can be used to feed combustion turbines, or used to create steam and power steam turbines coupled to electric generators. The syngas can also be used as feedstock for a Fischer-Tropsch (FT) plant for the production of synthetic liquid petroleum fuels such as diesel and jet fuel.

The task force’s financial analysis of the gasifier option shows an incremental reduction in electrical costs in excess of 50%, and a cost reduction in (FT) diesel fuel in excess of 30%, with locally - available coal as the initial fuel and biomass co-feed at a later time as it becomes available and feasible. Using this energy, the residential energy bill could be reduced by 23%..."

And, note: This is in oil-rich Alaska; and, the "locally-available" coal they would be using is low-BTU, high-ash - relative to WV bituminous - lignite. Yet, implementation of coal-to-liquid technology will result in across-the-board energy savings in excess of 20%.

The "biomass co-feed at a later time" would help with any CO2 emissions, wouldn't it? If, that is, they aren't forward-thinking enough to, as we've documented to be imminently feasible/practical, directly capture and recycle the CO2, as well.

Leftover Gets a Makeover: Professor Develops a New Use for Coal Ash

 
 
We had earlier reported to you on this development, but wanted to send it along again, in further support of our thesis that the by-products of coal utilization, the CO2 and even the coal ash, can be constructively utilized - if we just put our minds to the task, instead of allowing ourselves to be drawn into a running firefight with those who are, justly, concerned about the environment.
 
An excerpt:
 
"An assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, (Prof. Mulalo) Doyoyo has developed a new structural material based on these leftovers from coal burning. Known as Cenocell, the material offers attributes that include high strength and light weight – without the use of cement, an essential ingredient of conventional concrete."
 
Our earlier research indicates that Cenocell could have a lot of good uses. It's a development that supports our theses that we can, and should, work towards the goal of making our utilization of coal a win-win proposition for all - and that means all of us - concerned; and, that coal has many, as yet unrealized but quite valuable, potentials.

Progres Check - Biomass and Coal to Gasoline | New Energy and Fuel

 

Of interest to us here is the combination of coal, coal waste and biomass.
 
An excerpt:
 
"SES (Synthesis Energy Systems) is the company with the three projects in China. The Chinese project’s range of outputs get up to making 1 million tons of methanol or 660,000 tons of DME. SES is working with CONSOL Energy Inc., the largest producer of bituminous coal in the U.S. to investigate the development of coal-based gasification facilities to replace domestic production of various industrial chemicals that have been shut down due to the high cost of natural gas. CONSOL produces over 20 million tons per year of coal preparation plant tailings that can be used to make valuable liquid and gas products instead of landfilling the coal trapped in this material."
 
We've noted all these efforts and all these companies' involvement in Coal-To-Liquid enterprises previously. Of special interest, again, is both the note made of the potential to utilize coal tailings (waste) as a raw material for liquid fuel, and chemical, manufacture; and, the inclusion of CO2-reducing biomass as a co-feed/raw material.
 
Coal can lead us into both energy independence and environmentally-responsible sustainability.

More Alaska: Military Eyes Alaska for Synthetic Fuel Project

 
 
"The Defense Energy Support Center, which is the Pentagon’s petroleum purchasing arm, hosted a Synthetic Fuels Industry Summit in mid-March in Anchorage."
 
Should you read the article, they're doing this because the Fairbanks CTL plant we reported earlier is a "separate endeavor".
 
And, a very interesting quote:

"For the last several years, the military has purchased synfuels from foreign countries, mostly Malaysia and South Africa, to test in aircraft in non-hostile environments. Aircraft will have to be certified to run on synfuels before the fuels can be widely used by the military."