[Graeme]

Obama, Huckabee, Clinton, Rockefeller and Romney Support Coal-to-Liquid Fuel$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')ilverado Green Fuel Inc. is at the forefront of one of the U.S.'s highest priorities in domestic energy supply and security, namely coal-to-liquid fuel.

"The endorsement from most Presidential candidates and key U.S. political figures, and the recent (Dec/07) U.S. Energy Bill's $2.2 billion in tax incentives for clean coal technology applications are sure signs that Silverado is in the right place, and at the right time," states Garry Anselmo, Silverado's President and CEO. "Silverado Green Fuel uses low rank coal. America has centuries of domestic supply of low rank coal, an underutilized energy resource." The company has a proven process to produce green fuel, equivalent to crude oil, but commercially created without any CO(2) or harmful environmental emissions in the production process. "And at less than one fifth the cost of crude oil," he adds.

Plans are underway for a $26 million Demonstration Plant in a joint venture with the State of Mississippi.

Silverado Green Fuel is commercially produced without releasing any harmful emissions into the air. Initial production costs are estimated at under US$15 per barrel, on an oil equivalent energy basis, compared to current $90 - $100/barrel crude oil prices.

Green Fuel can be used to power oil-fired power plants directly, or be used as a feedstock for further processing to produce transportation fuels (jet, diesel, gasoline), key agricultural compounds (fertilizers, synthetic petrochemical feedstocks, urea), industrial products (oils, lubricants, synthetics) and even consumer products (plastics, packaging, etc.). Silverado Green Fuel can also be further processed to produce pure, clean hydrogen to power fuel cell automobiles and electrical generation (power) plants.

[Tanada]

To say I am not surprised would probably be the understatement of the decade.

We will dig it drill it or scoop it all up and burn it as long as we are able. GWG and Climate Change be damned! TPTB have Spoken!

[Bas]

next best (I should say next worse) option from biofuels...they are either deaf, dumb or know they can't sell the truth.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'W')e will dig it drill it or scoop it all up and burn it as long as we are able. GWG and Climate Change be damned! TPTB have Spoken!

[TheTurtle]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'W')hat do you expect TPTB to say? "You'll all have to bicycle to the polls, but please vote for me anyway?" Like that's gonna happen.

[Bas]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'W')e will dig it drill it or scoop it all up and burn it as long as we are able. GWG and Climate Change be damned! TPTB have Spoken!

[steam_cannon]

Coal-to-Liquid Fuel

You know that always makes me think of desperate Nazi Germany. Coal to liquids works, but it certainly hasn't won any wars. And if we're considering options as nasty as that, we really must be desperate. More on topic, this is scrapping the bottom of the barrel for EROEI and will probably be very difficult to ramp up coal production for this process. But regarding being green if they do succeed in large scale trapping of CO2, well hats off to them for that.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'W')hat do you expect TPTB to say? "You'll all have to bicycle to the polls, but please vote for me anyway?" Like that's gonna happen.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'W')e will dig it drill it or scoop it all up and burn it as long as we are able. GWG and Climate Change be damned! TPTB have Spoken!

[dorlomin]

Its 1940s technology that can be fabricated without any great or unique skill sets.

Have a look at what the US, Soviets, Germans and UK did during WWII, in terms of producing, often complex machines in staggering volumes when the chips were down. The UKs frigat and Corvette programs, the Germans uboat's and tanks, the Soviets Sturmoviks or the US's bombers, carriers and battleships.

I dont see any real impediment to various nations implementing crash programs to manufacture huge new industrial facilities. We ar not talking nanotechnology or neural networks here.

[dohboi]

I though Obama backed off of this idea after flirting with it briefly a few months ago. Is he supporting it again?

[Ludi]

No doubt they also say they are concerned about global warming.

[vampyregirl]

the gasification process involves heating pulverized coal to yield carbon dioxide and hydrogen gas which form to produce synthetic natural gas or syngas. polluting elements such as sulfur and mercury are filtered out so it can be burned cleanly. it is used in europe to produce electricity and somewhat in china now. the new aim is to produce syndiesel from syngas. combine the two technologies so to speak

[mattduke]

New coal ETF:

http://peakoil.com/fortopic35658.html

[TheDude]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dorlomin', 'I')ts 1940s technology that can be fabricated without any great or unique skill sets.

Have a look at what the US, Soviets, Germans and UK did during WWII, in terms of producing, often complex machines in staggering volumes when the chips were down.

[Graeme]

Word nears on 'liquid-coal' plant

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')t has been more than a decade since John W. Rich Jr. got the idea to build the nation's first plant to convert coal into diesel fuel on a mountaintop in Schuylkill County.

Now, after years of delays, Rich is close to finding out whether he will receive the approvals he needs to jump-start the project. Just a year ago Rich's plans appeared destined for death from a case of fickle government bureaucracy.

By Jan. 31, the U.S. Department of Energy is expected to decide whether to lend Rich $100 million. The money would go a long way toward securing the private financing needed to finally put shovel into ground to build the $1 billion facility on 75 acres that Rich owns in Gilberton, about 100 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

Rich's plant would generate about 60 million gallons of fuel a year, a fraction of the 141 billion gallons of gasoline the United States uses annually.

[thuja]

Lucky for us...Peak Coal

The bastards can't squeeze oil out of a lump of rock for too much longer...

[Graeme]

Coal is no longer on front burner

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')merica's headlong rush to tap its enormous coal reserves for electricity has slowed abruptly, with more than 50 proposed coal-fired power plants in 20 states canceled or delayed in 2007 because of concerns about climate change, construction costs and transportation problems.

"We're very close to the edge," said Rick Sergel, who keeps a close eye on the grid as chief executive of the quasi-governmental North American Electric Reliability Corp. "We operate under tight conditions more often than ever. We need action in the next year or two to start on the path to having enough electricity 10 years from now."

In the near term, coal clearly will remain a part of the American energy picture. Even as the postponements and terminations pile up, plans for new coal-fired power plants continue to advance in New Mexico, Mississippi and Indiana.

Although TXU Energy canceled eight coal-fired power plants it had proposed in Texas, the utility is going ahead with three others.

Last month, an energy industry consortium announced plans to build a government-subsidized power plant in southern Illinois to demonstrate low-emissions coal technology. But the ballooning cost of the FutureGen plant -- now projected to be about $1.8 billion, nearly double its original estimated price tag -- has drawn criticism from the Department of Energy, which could delay or kill the project by withholding funds.

"Can coal deliver?" asked Gary Hunt, president of Global Energy Advisors, a Sacramento-based unit of Global Energy Decisions. "The answer is no," he said -- not without "billions and billions" spent on improvements for mining capacity, railroads and shipping.

Overall, the Assn. of American Railroads estimates that $148 billion needs to be invested in freight infrastructure over the next 28 years. The industry says it needs federal assistance to help it cover about $39 billion of that cost.

Coal's advocates say they are still optimistic about the future, because America has 200 years' worth of reserves -- and growing electricity needs. "If you don't want to use coal," asks Janet Gellici, executive director of the American Coal Council, "which 12 hours of the day don't you want electricity?"

[Graeme]

Liquid coal touted as good fuel bet if ethanol fails

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'R')efining coal into liquids is the next logical step should it become clear that corn-based ethanol is not the solution to the transportation fuel problem, the developer of a coal-to-liquids plant said on Tuesday.

"Does it make sense to burn your food supply ... to make what is in our estimation an inferior transportation fuel?" Robert Kelly, chairman of DKRW Advanced Fuels LLC, told a questioner at Cambridge Energy Research Associates' 2008 conference.

"We've got a huge amount of coal here," Kelly said after a breakfast presentation, noting U.S. coal reserves are among the world's largest. "It is a huge fuel source for the next 50 years if we do it responsibly."