U.S. May Fall Behind on Coal Technology
Posted on: Monday, 21 July 2008, 15:00 CDT
The United States may fall behind in carbon dioxide-storage technology, the vice president of Consol Energy Inc. warned.
If the United States chooses not to make the necessary investments Â… then there's the potential that the U.S. will not be exporting the technology, but importing it, said executive Steven Winberg.
The company has invested about $500,000 in a prototype 275-megawatt coal power plant slated for Mattoon, Ill, that would separate the pollutant carbon dioxide and store it thousands of feet underground, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported Monday.
The U.S. Department of Energy pulled away from the investment, when construction costs mushroomed from $1 billion to $1.8 billion, the report said.
The concept found support at the G-8 economic summit in Japan in June. G-8 leaders called for 20 large demonstration projects to be up and running by 2010.
Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has said he supports the concept, but noted cost is a legitimate concern.
Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has thrown support specifically to the Mattoon project, signing a letter that charged the Department of Energy pulled away because Illinois was chosen for the project, rather than President George Bush's home state of Texas, the report said.
Source: United Press International
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