RE: the EU's new 'Industrial Emissions Directive' (IED) - likely impact on existing UK coal plants

[Chris Hodrien]

Source: 'Drax wants dedicated subsidy banding for coal-to-biomass conversions' - Power Eng Int. 02july10

http://www.powergenworldwide.com/index/display/articledisplay/1947049183/articles/powergenworldwide/renewables/biomass/2010/07/drax-wants_dedicated.html

(- highlights added by CH)

 

Looking ahead, Drax's CEO Dorothy Thompson said Drax would have to fit Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) equipment in order to comply with new oxides of nitrogen emission limit values contained in the EU's Industrial Emissions Directive, currently (7/10) in the final stages of agreement in Brussels.

 

"Every* coal plant in the UK fails to meet the IED's proposed (tougher) NOx limits, and only a few meet the SO2 limits," she said. "Drax is the most efficient coal plant in the UK [efficiency is close to 40 per cent], so we will certainly be looking to fit SCR and so operate well beyond the 2020 'transitional' period," she said.

 

Engineers at the briefing said Drax already met the IED's SO2 limits. Plenty of other less efficient coal plants in the UK did not, however. "In my opinion, each major utility will want to have one 'clean coal' plant in 2020--one fitted with SCR and flue gas desulfurization- to offset their gas plant." That meant survival of around six 2 GW coal plants in the UK plus Drax, the engineer said. Drax Power operates six 660 MW coal fired units in Selby, North Yorkshire.

 

(- So that means c.16 GW of surviving existing coal capacity. Any new CCS new-build demo plants would probably replace an existing older unit, like EOn Kingsnorth,rather than be a net capacity addition- Chris H.)

[bernar...@aol.com]

Chris,

I wonder when it will dawn on us that the much lower requirement for CO2 capture on a gas fired combined cycle plant makes the coal option look like a lobbyists dream?

The recovery of gas from shale oil at reasonable prices seems superficially to make that a no brainer to stop burning a fuel which is mainly carbon and go for one which has water as the main product of combustion. .  If my memory is correct there are some decent sized deposits in Northern Ireland and a lot more in Poland. Or am I missing something?

Best Regards

Bernard

[Chris Hodrien]

Dear Bernard,

I quite agree that CCS on gas plants makes both technical and moral sense to meet UK CO2 targets, DECC's 'obsessing' on just the coal plants (a shrinking minority) has always seemed illogical to me.

 

But until the recent US shale gas recovery technnolgy reaching break-even costs, it was widely assumed for fuel planning purposes that gas would become progressively more expensive relative to coal. Clearly, a significant re-think is now in order, and is happening (power Co's aren't stupid where cost/profit is concerned!)

 

However, current reality/DECC policy is as follows:

The owners of current existing UK coal plants will continue to want to run those ones (about half or less, rest will close voluntarily) on which they can still make profit after paying for additional 'life-extension' mod's, and for SCR de-NOx, FGD etc to meet the needs of the EU IED Directive (2021 target date). Neither that Directive nor DECC require them to fit CCS to deal with CO2 as well - in DECC's current thinking, CCS will only be mandated (if at all!) on new-build coal plants, at some unspecified date in the future after it has been 'economically proven' (leaving both DECC and the Power Co's lots of 'wiggle-room').

 

DECC 'is just thinking' about including 1 gas plant in the delayed phase 2 (plants 2-4) of the subsidised CCS demo programme  http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/news/PN10_117/PN10_117.aspx (wow!-movement!) after some 'kicking' by the I Mech E and the CCC, but currently, CCS is not mandated on any new gas plant, which are being sanctioned right now 'to stop the lights going out' as older coal and nukes close in 2016/ 2021.

 

DECC seems to have no strong view on whether the UK based power Co's burn coal or gas - no sign of a national strategy, they still want the market to decide. I think they would vaguely like to retain at least some coal in the mix for sensible fuel diversity (security) reasons in case of a major stoppage incident of the UK gas network.

 

At current gas prices, what's a 'no-brainer' is to build a gas plant with no CCS (not mandated, although a study for being CCS 'capture-ready' is) vs. a new coal plant with CCS. This is exactly what the market is doing, 'in spades' - EON have withdrawn Kingsnorth and a big fleet of new non-CCS gas CCGT plants are being granted permits.  But how long this cheap gas 'bubble' (relative to world coal prices) will last is unclear, because the delivery rate of these new shale gas fields (if not their total reserves) has been significantly 'over-hyped' by even the 'serious' technical media, also the EPA are taking a serious look at the pollution problems arising from their 'frac-ing' operations. There is still a significant likelihood that it will not last for the entire lifetime of these new gas plants.

I am not aware (that might be ignorance) of any sizeable economically workable deposits of shale gas in Northern Ireland or Poland, though there are plenty of folk out looking! The possible economically workable  shale gas (and coal-bed methane) reserve is simply unknown at present - could be very large.

 

By the way,there is one technical issue with CCS on gas plants, that the higher free oxygen in their exhaust tends to attack conventional amine solvents, but it has been done - the Bellingham GT plant in Massachusetts ran for its complete 15 years life cycle (- oh yes, carbon Capture  has been done!).

Regards, Chris.