Clean coal: miracle or furphy?

17 Nov 2009, 2:01 pm   -   Source: SBS
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Clean coal: a viable solution for Australia? (Getty Images)

Clean coal: a viable solution for Australia? (Getty Images)

Scientists are quite divided on whether the clean coal technology is viable in Australia. Here are their opinions.

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Scientists are quite divided on whether the clean coal technology is viable in Australia. Here are some opinions.

Technology 'will be ready too late'

Mark Diesendorf, from the Institute of Environmental Studies at the University of New South Wales, says clean coal won't be commercially available before the early 2020s.

"The recent report on 'The Future of Coal' by an expert interdisciplinary group at MIT envisages that the technology will start to make a noticeable contribution on a global scale around 2025 and may overtake renewable energy around 2045," Mr Diesendorf said.

"Clearly, Australia would be foolish to delay energy efficiency and renewable energy programs, which could be implemented now, until such time as coal with CCS may be commercially available," he said.

"With the huge amounts of money being invested in coal power with CCS, several pilot plants will be constructed around the world before 2020, but these will be a long way from safe, proven, commercially available systems".

'We should be supporting all alternatives'

Professor John Kaldi is Chair of Geosequestration at the Australian School of Petroleum at the University of Adelaide and Chief Scientist for the Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies (CO2CRC).

Professor Kaldi says tackling climate change requires a range of solutions and is not about competing technologies.

"We need an entire portfolio of strategies that include renewables, as well as clean coal technology. We should be supporting all the alternatives".

Professor Ian Lowe is an Emeritus Professor of science, technology and society at Griffith University, and President of the Australian Conservation Foundation.

Professor Lowe says it is entirely reasonable to do research on ‘clean coal’ in the same spirit as we do research on nuclear fusion.

"Even though the probability of success appears low, but the payoff would be huge. I don't think it is justifiable to base our entire energy policy on the implicit presumption that ‘clean coal’ will prove technically and economically feasible," he says.

"The point of scale is also important; the World Energy Council, which is quite technocratic in emphasis, has noted that moving the volume of liquefied carbon dioxide from existing fossil fuel power stations to storage sites, assuming that the problems of capture and compression have been solved, would be an undertaking similar in scale to the entire present oil and gas industry.

Clean coal 'to slow down renewables'

Mr Barney Foran is visiting fellow at the centre for Resource and Environmental Studies at the Australian National University. He led the Resource Futures Programme at CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems and has a background in agriculture, ecology and physical economics.

Mr Foran says efforts to develop a clean coal technology in Australia will slow down the development in the renewable energy resources sector.

“Analyses on the full production chain (a life cycle analysis) of an advanced coal power plant with sequestration reveal that a 63% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions can be achieved, Mr Foran said.

"This takes it down to just under 500 grams of carbon dioxide emitted per kilowatt hour compared to 1000 to 1300 grams per kilowatt hour in plants currently operating.

"The CO2 scrubbing, compression, pipelining and injection impose a parasitic load on the whole system that reduces production efficiency that can then hinder economic growth and output.

"But relying on ‘end of pipe’ technologies for cleaning and storage of waste from coal and nuclear, delays Australia's progression to an advanced industrial structure where most, but not all, energy could come from renewable sources.

Clean coal technology 'advancing quickly'

Nobuo Tanaka is the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA). 

He says despite climate change, there is a strong future for the backbone of the Australian economy - coal.

He said Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) - which captures the carbon emissions from burning coal and buries those emissions underground - was "advancing".

"Technological innovation is happening, the cost is coming much lower, so, I think, the future is there," Mr Tanaka told AAP at a media event in Copenhagen.

"We still think that coal has a long-term future, because technology is coming."

Mr Tanaka said the technology to capture carbon emissions was already quite good - using chemicals or algae for example - but more work was needed on carbon storage.

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Your Comments

Coal, a dust cloud of Death

Ye God - from Sydney, 2 years ago

We have been fooling ourselves for years. Very cheap electricity from coal while polluting and it will take 25 years before cct MIGHT become effective! What a lousy bargain. We should be investing heavily in renewables, selling uranium O/S as it only takes 10 years to build Nuc plants (with a generally good safety record unlike the effect of coal) and there are new vastly improved plants on the drawing boards. WE HAVE TWIDDLED OUR THUMBS FOR TOO LONG and have no time time left.

Addited to Coal (pollution)

Bob of Brissy - from Brisbane, 2 years ago

Has anybody noticed how wording has changed to evade the truth. Coal producers are called "emitters" when they should be CO2 "Polluters". Saves face when trying to sell and industry that is killing the future.Remember ther outrage to hear successive Aus govts were aware of how asbestos was/is killing people yet were happy to receive the tax money and allow the mining for another 50 years or so. Could say the same about tobacco too, although the govt still allows this poison to be sold

Climate change

Jack - from Mackay, 2 years ago

I have said it before. We have waited too long to start to fund the cleaning of coal, anyway, it should be paid for by the business operator like any business which has to improve its product. Nuclear power has a 50 year history of generally safe & CO2 free operation, Coal has a min 200 year history of poisoning people and the atmosphere. All funding for clean coal should immediately transfered to renewables and spent fuel rod containment. Coal is like heroin, uranium like methodone a vital evil

Pollute underground or not perhaps at all?

Brendon Pywell - from Sydney, 2 years ago

Burying the pollution instead of not making the pollution to begin with is a band-aid fix. This is a desperate effort to save the currently polluting coal industry based on unproven yet-to-be-created technology that buries the pollution rather than eliminating it. Current cleaner technologies that work today are a better option because they don’t create pollution to begin with. Invest in new technologies that explore greener options rather than propping up an aging dinosaur.

RE: Why can't we do it now?

Jacob - from Melbourne, 3 years ago

@Darren But what if we invest all the money and it fails? That money could have been used on something more productive. I just would hate to "delays Australia's progression to an advanced industrial structure where most, but not all, energy could come from renewable sources."... particularly if it all ended up not working anyway.

Why can't we do it now?

Darren - from Ballarat, 3 years ago

If we know the theory on how it works, why can't we just roll it out now as a trial. If storing the emissions underground are safe, and money is the only obstacle, surely making an investment into one large scale plant would be the best option to test the viability and use as a learning experience? What is stopping us from building a CCS plant now?

Stop using the word clean coal

Mike - from Sydney, 3 years ago

It is not clean. Use the word pollution capture or carbon capture.

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