Coal power through syngas

[Keith Henson]

If you just burn a tonne of coal for power, you get around 2.2 MWh
~40% efficient.

If you gasify a tonne of coal using 4 MWh of off-peak renewable power,
you get about 12.5 MWh of syngas, which you can burn to get 6 MWh of
power. Thus, you can get about 3 times as much energy from a tonne of
coal by gasifying it first as you get from burning it. Of course, you
need to put in 4 MWh of renewable energy to do that. But it still
beats burning it, and if you want, you can sort out at least half the
CO2, perhaps all of it, for sequestration, leaving cheap, more or less
pure hydrogen.

Keith

[Keith Henson]

On Tue, Apr 7, 2026 at 6:32 PM Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Keith, how do you get to 12.5 MWh of syngas?

C + H2O -> CO + H2 Delta H = +131 kJ/mol (endothermic)

12 18 28 2

1 1.5 2.33 .166

(A ton of carbon gives 2.5 tons of syngas, which has an energy of 6.5
MWh for CO and ~6 MWh for H2 per ton of vaporized carbon)

Per metric ton of carbon (atomic mass 12, so approximately 83,300 mol/ton):

Please check the numbers.
Keith
> PG

>> --
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Inventor's Lunch" group.
>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to inventors-lun...@googlegroups.com.
>> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/inventors-lunch/CAPiwVB6pBnyKNWy2iF%2BbtbHpz88BE46UwfpAY1XG5cWqP37qYw%40mail.gmail.com.
>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Keith Lofstrom]

...

> Keith Henson

------------------------------------

First, my apologies to those who HKH included in the CC list, and
may not be interested in this topic or my "improvement" of it.
I will not send any more to those lists and individuals unless
I receive emails explicitly asking me to.

------------------------------------

CO₂ sequestration is an expensive way to doom the Earth in 0.2% of
its 200 million year potential habitable span, though marginally
better than 5ppm of that time . CO₂ is a chemically-mostly-inert
non-polar gas, far lighter than petroleum, hence more geologically
mobile. CO₂ leaks out, in much less than geological time.

----

Instead ...

For off-peak renewable energy, magnetically-deflected kinetic energy
storage rings STORE energy proportional to radius (and mass) SQUARED,
in a form that is easily "motor-generatored", transformable to and
from "watts on the wire". At large scale, gigawatts for HVDC power
lines without gears and axles and lubricants.

Yes, a ring will need a BIG (but narrow) circular trench. The trench
contains shrapnel from a "real-time managed failure".

An 8 GW-hour ring might be in a trench 1 meter across, 5 meters deep
and 60 kilometers in diameter, using perhaps 40 thousand tonnes of
iron ... as much as the Burj Khalifa, less than the Empire State
building, 1/3 of a TI-class supertanker.

The iron is used for stationary electromagnet poles (silicon steel),
plus a soft iron rotor ring moving 4000 meters per second ( 20 ppm
of "electronic signaling speed of light". )

The rings would be unstable without measurement and feedback, but
electronics and computation are vastly faster than instabilities,
propagating corrections (and controlled failure commands) around
the ring in less than a millisecond. VASTLY easier (and cheaper)
than particle accelerators like LHC and Fermilab Tevatron.

No superconductors; that was my master's thesis, as dangerous as
a pedal bicycle downhill at 60mph (I've also done THAT).

Hopefully, hundreds of energy rings can be built under farmland.
As numbers increase, costs can drop with "learning curve"
(typically, twice as much costs 1.6x ).

Even better, below the photic zone of the Pacific Ocean:

http://launchloop.com/PowerLoop

But then, my day job is chip engineer, and learning curve has
dropped calculation costs by a factor of a trillion over my
career. I wash away enormous problems with the transistor hose.
If Moore's Law is not in your toolbox, you lose, sooner or later.
I apply VLSI to measurement and control systems; to flames and
superconductors, no.

I've built small feedback-controlled iron levitators, but I
don't have a safe place to build and test decameter-to-MUCH-
LARGER rings that might Throw Chunks. The Pacific Ocean,
Hanford, and Edwards Air Force Base might be good places
to test medium-to-large-scale energy storage rings.

Those rings can scale to launch loop: http://launchloop.com
18 kWh/kg to escape. The best place to gather kW (and MW and
GW and TW and EW) is Out There in the 4 Kelvin Heat Sink,
which (surprise!) is actually ON TOPIC for the power satellite
economics email list. Better to USE the power Out There, too.

http://server-sky.com/L1AI

I'm too old to play desert rat, but if someone reading this is
willing to solder circuits and eat dust for a few years, then
caviar in a Bombardier afterwards, send email and lets palaver.

Keith Lofstrom (KHL, not HKH)

--
Keith Lofstrom kei...@keithl.com

[Simon Quellen Field AB6NY]

All of the energy is still coming from the oxidation of carbon.

If burning the carbon is 40% efficient, going to 100% efficient would be 2.5 times more energy.

Your claim of 3 times more energy implies somehow being more efficient than 100%.

You are wasting 4 MWh to get 6 MWh already, which is 66% wasted energy.

If you can get 6.5 MWh out of the CO, why can't you get more than that out of the C?

The energy from the hydrogen came from splitting the hydrogen away from the water, so you can't count that.

This whole idea assumes that the renewable energy can't be used to reduce carbon burning.

We are decades away from that point.

There are less wasteful ways to store renewable energy, and cheaper ways to get that energy to places where carbon is still being burned.

Putting the money into improving the grid makes more sense.

Virus-free.www.avast.com

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/inventors-lunch/CAPiwVB5hwf5_fzeeyHGcEF9YZRGAg46yJLrT1-hLjs-gncmd2w%40mail.gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 6:24 AM Simon Quellen Field AB6NY <simon...@gmail.com> wrote:

All of the energy is still coming from the oxidation of carbon.

If burning the carbon is 40% efficient, going to 100% efficient would be 2.5 times more energy.

Your claim of 3 times more energy implies somehow being more efficient than 100%.

This is tons of coal to electrical energy comparison.  Takes about 1/3 as much coal to make a given amount of energy.  I am thinking about Germany which burns a lot of coal.  If the point is to put less CO2 in the air, this is a way to reduce the amount of coal required for a power plant to one third.

You are wasting 4 MWh to get 6 MWh already, which is 66% wasted energy.

Not wasting 4 MWh/ton of coal, you make 12.5 MWh of syngas from which you can get 6 MWh back if you just burn it.  Or you can make it into liquid fuels, something Germany did back in WW II.

If you can get 6.5 MWh out of the CO, why can't you get more than that out of the C?

The best you can do with thermal power plants is around 40%.  Combined cycle gas turbines typically get 60%.  But that's not the main point, even now there are significant times when renewable power is curtailed, wasted, because the grid can't absorb it.  Making storable syngas out of electrical power and coal would allow a large expansion of renewable sources by providing a sink for any excess generation over current electrical consumption.

The energy from the hydrogen came from splitting the hydrogen away from the water, so you can't count that.

Why not?  Heating carbon in steam (after water gas shift) makes 1/3 of a ton of hydrogen per ton of carbon, about 12 MWh/ton.  Electrolytic hydrogen takes 50 MWh/ton.  And unlike stack gas, it is easy to sort out the CO2 to sequester it.

This whole idea assumes that the renewable energy can't be used to reduce carbon burning.

Right.  Renewable energy in excess of current demand is useless with current technology (except for minor battery charging).

We are decades away from that point.

Perhaps.  Making syngas on a large scale might be faster than constructing a nuclear reactor though.

There are less wasteful ways to store renewable energy,

All of them have problems.  Pumped storage is great but limited by water access and geography,  Batteries are expensive and have limited capacity.  And it is worth remembering Moss Landing.

and cheaper ways to get that energy to places where carbon is still being burned.

Please go into details.  If there is a better way, I will support that instead of the syngas approach.

Putting the money into improving the grid makes more sense.

This is a way to improve the grid.  Storing renewable energy in syngas avoids having to burn such a large amount of fossil fuels when renewable energy is not available.

Keith

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 12:02 PM Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:

First, coal is 65-90% carbon. 

Second, I’m struggling to understand your numbers. From first principles:

Regular carbon oxidation

C+O2 = -393 kJ/mol

Syngas oxidation

CO + O = -283 kJ/mol

H2 + O = -286 kJ/mol

Energy to synthesize syngas

H2O -> H2 + O = 286 kJ/mol

C + O = -110 kJ/mol (wasted, or recovered at low efficiency)

Even assuming 100% efficiency for the H2O -> H2, syngas produces -283 kJ/mol vs -393 kJ/mol for carbon.

While there is value in removing impurities and water in coal to get to higher combustion efficiencies, it is not obvious that turning coal into syngas is a good way to accomplish this

What am I missing?

C + H₂O -> CO + H₂    Delta H = +131 kJ/mol (endothermic)

It takes just over 3 MWh/ton to drive this reaction and just under 1 MWh to make the 1.5 tons of superheated steam consumed by the reaction.  Wet coal (or wet MSW) is not a problem.

PG

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/inventors-lunch/CAPiwVB5CwfkVOGAzW70yhYbNj68a7Hk1op9Kj4sBBEc-RnLKUg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

I have not run the numbers yet, but induction heating may be a way to reduce one of the largest CO2 sources, namely, making steel.  I don't know how high it is, but a substantial fraction of the coke or coal that goes into blast furnaces is burned to provide process heat. You still need to reduce the iron oxide, but providing the heat from electric power would (I think) considerably decrease the CO2 per ton of steel produced.  This is subject to careful examination by metallurgists.  It will take them a bit of time to consider decoupling the source of process heat from the reduction process. 

Keith

[Geoffrey Landis]

Yes, I’m having problems reconciling these numbers.

You say 

>A ton of carbon gives 2.5 tons of syngas, which has an energy of 6.5 MWh for CO 

but later you say 

>If you just burn a tonne of coal for power, you get around 2.2 MWh ~40% efficient.

2.2 MWh at 40% efficiency means  the combustion must have yielded 5.5 MWh. But since burning a mole of CO yields only 72% of the energy as burning a mole of C, these can’t both be right.

—

Geoffrey A. Landis

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 3:21 PM Geoffrey Landis
<geoffre...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Yes, I’m having problems reconciling these numbers.
>
> You say
> >A ton of carbon gives 2.5 tons of syngas, which has an energy of 6.5 MWh for CO
>
> but later you say
> >If you just burn a tonne of coal for power, you get around 2.2 MWh ~40% efficient.

"One tonne (1,000 kg or ~2,205 lbs) of coal contains approximately to
gigajoules (GJ) of thermal energy, varying by type. When burned in a
power plant, this translates to 1.9 to 2.5 MW-hours of electricity,"
Google AI.

> 2.2 MWh at 40% efficiency means the combustion must have yielded 5.5 MWh. But since burning a mole of CO yields only 72% of the energy as burning a mole of C, these can’t both be right.

AI Overview
"Based on a lower heating value (LHV) of approximately 10.11 MJ/kg for
carbon monoxide (CO), 2.5 metric tons (2,500 kg) of carbon monoxide
contains roughly 7.02 MWh of gross energy."

You also get ~6 MWh of hydrogen.

If you feed 13 MWh of gas to a combined cycle turbine, you get at
least 6 MWh back. (This is conservative, 60% efficient gives 7.8 MWh)
> —
> Geoffrey A. Landis
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Power Satellite Economics" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to power-satellite-ec...@googlegroups.com.
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/power-satellite-economics/7AC40CBD-FF55-4F1B-AE12-E2222F770868%40gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

"What am I missing? "

I think you might have the same thing I ran into. The heat from
burning hydrogen depends on condensing the water or not.

Best wishes,

Keith

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 3:27 PM Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Fixed typos:
>
> Why the switch from mol to ton? (Pet peeve, please stay with one set of units)
>
> Looked more into syngas production, looks like they are heating water and carbon to 1000K to drive spontaneous reaction of C + HO2 to CO + H2
>
> How is this not perpetual motion?
>
> Reverse cycle:
> CO2 + 393 kJ/mol -> C + O2
> C + H2O + 131 kJ/mol -> CO + H2
> Total: 524 kJ/mol
>
> Forward cycle:
> CO + O -> -283 kJ/mol + CO2
> H2 + O -> -286 kJ/mol + H2O
> Total: -569 kJ/mol
>
> Reverse cycle takes less energy than the forward cycle. Assuming a 100% efficient process, you get 25 kJ/mol more energy out than you put in. What am I missing?
>
> On Apr 8, 2026, at 3:22 PM, Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Why the switch from mol to ton? (Pet peeve, please stay with one set of units)
>
> Looked more into syngas production, looks like they are heating water and carbon to 1000K to drive spontaneous reaction of C + O2 to CO + H2
>
> How is this not perpetual motion?
>
> Reverse cycle:
> CO2 + 393 kJ/mol -> C + O2
> C + H2O + 131 kJ/mol -> CO + H2
> Total: 524 kJ/mol
>
> Forward cycle:
> CO + O -> -283 kJ/mol + CO2
> H2 + O -> -286 kJ/mol + H2O
> Total: 569 kJ/mol
>
> Reverse cycle takes less energy than the forward cycle. Assuming a 100% efficient process, you get 25 kJ/mol more energy out than you put in. What am I missing?

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 9:27 PM Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> We are facing a climate catastrophe because these so called alternatives are always “within reach” but raw economics keep winning and we get more fossil fuel plants.
>
> It is important to accept that solar and wind does not work for industry.

A major name in the AI field read through the paper and got it.
(Sorry, I have not asked if I could post his name.) Within the hour,
he sent me a specific proposal to use solar, and this scheme to make
24/7 power for a data center.

I was in awe. Of course, he used an AI to write the proposal, but still.

Keith

I helped evaluate a 2 GW wind site and the data clearly showed
multiple 10 day stretches a year with less than 20% nameplate
capacity. Solar was a little better, but a good storm can take out a
few days, and you would think that wind can make it up, but that is
precisely when winds are too high and you need to lock the wind
turbines down so that they do not overload and run away. And they
wanted to do data centers there… when your plans require a 2 GW gas
turbine as a backup generator, it’s easier to skip the wind and solar
and just build the gas plant.
>
> Maybe during the next depression our government will start another public works project where they spend a few $T to install $24 TW/day of solar and battery, but even then the petrochemical interests will tie it up in environmental/regulatory review for years so that we do not hurt their bottom line
>
> The EPA is literally being used as a weapon against green energy, while oil and gas plants get a free pass. This is why I’m a big advocate for nuclear. Take a proven design. All 1960s designs have worked for decades with least damage to environment and people, far less than wind and solar, cut the red tape and go solve the biggest environment and geopolitical problem of our time.
>
> On Apr 8, 2026, at 8:50 PM, William Arnett <waar...@mac.com> wrote:
>
> Use the batteries in EVs. That makes it almost free. (Or, you only pay once for two functions.)
>
> I’m fine with nukes for backup. But I’m not sure we need any new ones at this point.
>
> Bill Arnett | bi...@arnett.us.com
>
> On Apr 8, 2026, at 8:39 PM, Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> 
> Even with the lowest cost solar, paired with the least expensive battery for off peak power is 4-12c per kWh at wholesale pricing.
>
> That is 3-4X higher than where nuclear can be with reasonable risk adjusted permitting.
>
> Not to mention that solar is unreliable as a industrial power source
>
> On Apr 8, 2026, at 8:09 PM, William Arnett <waar...@mac.com> wrote:
>
> 
> If I had a billion dollars to spend on energy production, I would buy solar panels, not nukes. My next billion would go toward more panels. Another billion might be split between solar and wind. Nuclear has the advantage of working at night but we don’t need all the much of it. We already have enough nukes + hydro to carry a quarter of the load. That should be enough for backup.
>
> Bill Arnett | bi...@arnett.us.com
>
> On Apr 8, 2026, at 7:02 PM, Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> If we really want to get serious about fixing our CO2 generation problem, we need to get back to nuclear.
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Inventor's Lunch" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to inventors-lun...@googlegroups.com.
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/inventors-lunch/BE4E1F86-3D6D-4493-80E5-E69102F0427A%40gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 8:09 PM William Arnett <waar...@mac.com> wrote:
>
> If I had a billion dollars to spend on energy production, I would buy solar panels, not nukes. My next billion would go toward more panels. Another billion might be split between solar and wind. Nuclear has the advantage of working at night but we don’t need all the much of it. We already have enough nukes + hydro to carry a quarter of the load. That should be enough for backup.

You should look at the ISO demand curve. The highest demand comes
just at the point the sun goes down. People get home from work and
cook dinner with electric stoves and microwave ovens while the air
conditioning is still on.

If a large part of the power were from nukes, it would cause the
reverse problem. That is why the big pumped hydro operation on Lake
Michigan. They built enough nuclear plants (that are hard to turn
down) and needed a load for them in the wee hours of the night.


Keith

[Keith Henson]

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 7:02 PM Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Ah thanks!
>
> I see what I missed now.
> H2 + O2 -> H2O(g) = -241.8 kJ/mol, not -285.8 kJ/mol
>
> Surprised that most syngas energy projects fail commercially even with such favorable feedstock economics.

The AIs tell me that nobody has previously proposed using induction to
get electric heat inside a gasifier. All the ones I know about to
date have used plasma torches. They are relatively small,
high-maintenance, and finicky to operate.
> —-

> If we really want to get serious about fixing our CO2 generation problem, we need to get back to nuclear.
>

> There has NEVER been a nuclear plant accident where more than 5 people died of radiation.
>
> Chornobyl was an engineered disaster designed to rebuild demand for oil and gas, USSR’s main export.

I doubt that, having read the accounts. Among other things, nuclear
power is not then in competition with oil. Now perhaps with electric
cars in the mix, but not back when Chornobyl burned up.

snip

Keith

[Keith Henson]

On Thu, Apr 9, 2026 at 1:34 AM William Arnett <waar...@mac.com> wrote:
>
> And that evening peak can be supplied with the energy from the electric car’s battery what was charged up while at work.

This might work for some, but I think it would not apply to a high
percentage of the population.

Keith
> Bill Arnett | bi...@arnett.us.com

[Keith Henson]

Best wishes,

Keith

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 2:57 PM Keith Henson <hkeith...@gmail.com> wrote:

I have not run the numbers yet, but induction heating may be a way to reduce one of the largest CO2 sources, namely, making steel.  I don't know how high it is, but a substantial fraction of the coke or coal that goes into blast furnaces is burned to provide process heat. You still need to reduce the iron oxide, but providing the heat from electric power would (I think) considerably decrease the CO2 per ton of steel produced.  This is subject to careful examination by metallurgists.  It will take them a bit of time to consider decoupling the source of process heat from the reduction process. 

Actually, I find this has already been done.  They mix iron ore with anything continuing carbon and heat it in an electric furnace like a cement kiln.  The oxygen in the iron comes off as CO, which is burned to provide the power to heat the iron and carbon.  Normally, the DRI would be transferred to an electric furnace for melting.  An induction furnace should work as well, perhaps better, with a melting zone below the iron reduction zone. 

"The coal-based blast furnace route is highly carbon-intensive, emitting roughly 2.2 to 2.3 tons of CO2

per ton of steel"

2(Fe2O3) + 6C -> 2Fe + 6 CO (6CO2)

112 96         72      112     168   264

                               1         1.5   2.3

Assuming you burn the CO to power the reduction heating, it makes just about the same amount of CO2 per ton of iron as a blast furnace.

So much for that idea.

Keith

[Paul Werbos]

There is an extremely important link from your SPS to syngas concept to issues which France24 tells me may decide the coming US elections!!!

FARMERS in the US are very upset here and now about the sudden rise in the cost of nitrogen-based fertilizers, which 

we import from the Gulf, which is blocked. This reminds me of a great technology history book, The Alchemy of Air, which the head of ARPA-E ( https://itif.org/person/arun-majumdar/)  once recommended to me and others from NSF.

BUT THE TECHNOLOGY TO PRODUCE NITROGEN FERTILIZERS DOES EXIST IN THE US, AND NEW SOURCES OF ELECTRICITY AND OTHER FORMS OF RENEWABLE FREE ENERGY SHOULD ALLOW US TO SCALE THIS UP!!!

ANYONE who seriously pushes a credible plan to make the US more independent (and more sustainable) that way,

drawing on ALL of our capabilities, might do better in the coming elections... and some of us should be talking to all people like that!!

PROCEDURALLY, I am reminded of my experience when I was a Senate staffer; see werbos.com/oil.htm for some lessons learned, when my office and Inhofe's office were able to help each other, and we would have good effective bipartisan climate legislation in action NOW if Reid had not let personal deals get in the way. Farmers might well decide the elections, and might actually care if a change of approach might actually work for them, and for all of us aiming at sustianable renewable elecytricity in general. 

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Power Satellite Economics" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to power-satellite-ec...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/power-satellite-economics/CAPiwVB6rLWMBDezWtYWsMcNVzG%2B-3i1kN2tPWD2%3D2ygiWUh9eQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

The cost of nitrogen fertilizers is directly related to the cost of
hydrogen. At present we get hydrogen from steam reforming natural
gas. Trying to make hydrogen from water via electrolysis takes 50 MWh
per tonne. Making it from waste, coal, or biomass with a gasifier
takes 12 MWh/ton. And gasifiers should be less expensive in capex than
electrolytic cells that are full of platinum.

Keith

[vid.b...@fotonika-lv.eu]

If this issue is going to matter in elections, it needs to translate into something concrete.

Here is a credible 3-point plan that directly addresses farm economics, energy security, and resilience:

---

1) Build Regional “Energy-to-Fertilizer” Hubs

Co-locate:

• Low-cost electricity (wind/solar in high-resource regions)

• Hydrogen production (electrolysis, scaling over time)

• Ammonia plants near major agricultural zones

Goal:
Reduce dependence on volatile natural gas markets and global supply chains by producing fertilizer closer to where it is used.

Political message:

“Make fertilizer in America, near American farms.”

---

2) Incentivize Distributed Storage for Grid + Agriculture

Support deployment of:

• Long-duration storage (including flow batteries and other chemistries)

• Containerized systems at substations and rural co-ops

Why it matters:

• Stabilizes power prices in rural regions

• Enables reliable use of low-cost renewable energy

• Protects farms from grid instability and price spikes

Political message:

“Lower power costs and keep the lights on in rural America.”

---

3) Tie Hydrogen Policy Directly to Fertilizer Security

Current hydrogen initiatives exist—but lack focus.

Redirect incentives to:

• Prioritize ammonia production for fertilizers, not just industrial or export uses

• Support early projects that link hydrogen → ammonia → agriculture

• Create long-term price stability mechanisms for fertilizer producers

Goal:
Turn hydrogen from a vague future industry into a direct tool for lowering farm input costs.

Political message:

“Use American energy to cut fertilizer prices.”

---

Bottom line

This is not about choosing between fossil fuels, renewables, or nuclear.

It’s about connecting energy policy to the cost structure of agriculture.

Right now, U.S. policy treats these as separate issues.
That is why farmers feel ignored—and why this is politically volatile.

A candidate who says clearly:

“We will lower your fertilizer costs by producing it here, powered by American energy”

…is not making a climate argument.

They are making an economic argument farmers can immediately understand—and vote on.

Vid Beldavs

---

No: power-satell...@googlegroups.com <power-satell...@googlegroups.com> lietotāja Paul Werbos <paul....@gmail.com> vārdā
Nosūtīts: Otrdiena, 2026. gada 14. aprīlis 18:27
Kam: Keith Henson <hkeith...@gmail.com>
Kopija: William Arnett <waar...@mac.com>; Peter Garbuz <peter....@gmail.com>; Simon Quellen Field AB6NY <simon...@gmail.com>; David Brin <db...@sbcglobal.net>; Howard Davidson <hl...@att.net>; Satellite Economics Power <power-satell...@googlegroups.com>; Inventor's Lunch <invento...@googlegroups.com>; Dale L. Skran LLC <dalels...@gmail.com>; Howard Bloom <howb...@gmail.com>; Gary Barnhard <gary.b...@xisp-inc.com>; Space Renaissance International <space-renaissa...@googlegroups.com>; Shawn Boike <spb...@gmail.com>
Tēma: FROM Coal power through syngas to US decisions gtoday and elections this year

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/power-satellite-economics/CACLqmgdpqb1Q%3Dq-eG-XO4kTxdHWJUdFRtXTYL0k8UMvNYNrBQg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Keith Henson]

On Tue, Apr 14, 2026 at 9:18 AM vid.b...@fotonika-lv.eu
<vid.b...@fotonika-lv.eu> wrote:
>
> If this issue is going to matter in elections, it needs to translate into something concrete.
>
> Here is a credible 3-point plan that directly addresses farm economics, energy security, and resilience:

There is an example of a plant right in the middle of the USA that
makes nitrogen fertilizer from petroleum coke. " Coffeyville
Resources Nitrogen Fertilizers plant in Coffeyville, Kansas. Owned by
CVR Partners, this facility gasifies petcoke—a byproduct of
refining—to produce hydrogen for creating ammonia and UAN fertilizer.
"

The plant burns a substantial fraction of the coke with oxygen in
steam to provide the process heat to combine water and carbon to make
syngas. The hydrogen content is boosted by the water gas shift
reaction at the expense of CO and then made into ammonia. Using solar
electricity for heat would provide a substantial increase in hydrogen
for the same amount of coke.

The follow-on effect of the blockade is likely to be a massive
shortfall in food production over the next year. I.e., a lot of people
are likely to starve from both the lack of fertilizer and a lack of
diesel fuel to move food. I could say more, but that is probably a bad
idea at the personal level.

Keith