AERO KUFM COMMENTARY

HOW REAL IS A COAL-TO LIQUID SYNTHETIC FUEL PLANT

FOR THE BULL MOUNTAINS?

 by: Wilbur Wood

November 16, 2006

Will coal be transformed into liquid fuel near a mine in the Bull Mountains, south of Roundup and north of Billings, Montana? Will this synthetic fuel plant be a pioneer for others around the United States? How realistic is this?

We’ll be arguing that it’s not very realistic. But first, let’s examine the proposal, which came on October 2nd with a flourish of publicity. Governor Brian Schweitzer announced that several large corporate players were looking into creating a facility that would turn coal to gas, then gas to liquid fuel, at a cost of 1.3 billion dollars.

This project would produce 22,000 barrels of diesel fuel per day, and part of this complex, an Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (or “IGCC”) power plant, would spin off 300 megawatts of electricity (some of it to power the plant itself) and remove various toxic pollutants while capturing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. These gases would then be “sequestered” -- pumped somewhere underground, most likely to depleted oil fields to force the last drops of petroleum to the surface.

All this, along with building a 35-mile railroad spur and power line to connect with the main railroad line and power grid, is projected to create a short-term boom, with thousands of construction jobs, then hundreds of permanent jobs, an increased local tax base, and a reversal of rural decline in this part of south-central Montana.

No state money will be used, said the Governor, because these big companies -- including Arch Minerals and General Electric -- have “deep pockets.”

Federal money, however, is another matter. The Governor's chief economic advisor, Evan Barrett, remarked that “of course, everyone is looking at federal incentives."

The timeframe? Within seven years, according to Governor Schweitzer, the plant could begin turning out some 337 million gallons of diesel fuel per year.

 

But there are problems with this scenario, starting with cost. “IGCC” coal-to-gas technology is extremely expensive. Massive federal subsidies will almost certainly be required before corporations will consent to dig significant cash out their “deep pockets”.

The entire coal to gas to fuel process, it is true, can release fewer pollutants into our air, but it also may produce even more carbon than conventional coal-burning power plants. So the promise of “clean coal” relies on “sequestering” this carbon, but if this cannot be done on site, it will have to be transported elsewhere. So you can likely add a “sequestration pipeline” to the 1.3 billion dollar pricetag.

Another pricetag problem -- and the first question that people ask about this project in semi-arid eastern Montana -- is this: Where are you going to get the water?

The Governor asserts that this proposed synfuel plant will consume only as much water as it takes to irrigate a 500-acre field of alfalfa. Based on figures from Montana State University, that would work out to about 326 million gallons per year. That’s almost a gallon of water for each gallon of synthetic fuel. One to one.

But that one-to-one figure likely encompasses only the chemical process itself. When you include the entire complex gasifying, liquifying, cooling process, the actual figure is probably five to one. (And that’s a conservative figure, gleaned from a variety of sources.)

At five gallons of water per gallon of fuel, the Bull Mountain synfuel plant would require one billion, 686 million gallons of water per year.

No surface water source in the Musselshell River Basin can come close to meeting that demand. Assuming water rights could even be obtained on the upper Yellowstone River, then another pipeline, very large, very long, very expensive, would have to be constructed, and Montana might meet with resistance from other states if it tries to transfer water from one basin (the Yellowstone) to another (the Musselshell).

The only other apparent source for billions of gallons of water is 8,600 feet beneath the mine: the Madison Aquifer. The Madison, under the Little Belt and Snowy Mountains, yields some of the finest drinking water on the planet, but by the time it has dived deep under the Bull Mountains it is both hot (perhaps 200 degrees Fahrenheit ) and full of minerals and salts.

It costs money to pull water up from that depth, money to remove the salts from this water, money to "dispose" of these salts -- assuming you can find a place to put them.

Coal seams in eastern Montana typically are also the aquifers that feed springs, wells and streams. Mining coal means mining the aquifer. It only compounds the problem to mine a deeper aquifer in order to turn coal into liquid fuel. Even if some promoters convince themselves that this is a good idea, the massive costs to do so may turn them away.

 

There is a way to produce diesel fuel that is cleaner, faster and cheaper: we can grow it.

Cleaner? For starters, no coal mining. No significant consumption of water to produce the fuel. And while you cannot “sequester” carbon that comes out of a tailpipe, whether it's from biodiesel or coal-derived diesel, carbon from biodiesel comes from plants -- not fossil fuels -- and therefore does not add extra carbon to the atmosphere. Carbon released by burning biofuels is consumed by next year's crop.

Faster? Biodiesel facilities can come online in months, not years, and can be built on a scale where farmers or communities can own them.

Cheaper? For one-third the cost of the proposed Bull Mountain synfuel plant, the same amount of bio-diesel could be produced each year by Montana farmers growing oilseed crops, processed in a number of bio-diesel plants around the state, spreading the wealth to our local communities.

Here in Montana we have an historic opportunity.. We can turn our backs on large, centralized, capital intensive, water intensive, energy intensive, polluting power projects that send most of their profits out of state. Instead, we can invest in energy efficiency and renewable energy sources -- like windpower and biodiesel -- and revitalize rural Montana while keeping most of the profits at home.

 

I’m Wilbur Wood for the Alternative Energy Resources Organization.

AERO welcomes your comments and perspectives. AERO is a grassroots membership organization working to help create farm, food and energy solutions for communities throughout Montana. For more information, call us in Helena at 406-443-7272.