CO2 Emission Reduction from Coal
Fired Plants
FutureGen 2.0 CO2 Capture Project
Steve Moorman
Mgr Business Development, Advanced
Technologies
Babcock & Wilcox
Relative to NOX, SOX, Hg, and Particulate the
scale of CO2 emissions control is enormous
A 600 MW Pulverized Coal plant firing low
sulfur coal generates
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< 1000 lbs/year of Mercury
8,000 tons/year of NOX
27,000 tons/year of SO2
150,000 tons/year of Ash
4,500,000 tons/year of CO2
2
Large Scale DOE Sponsored CO2 Capture
and Storage Projects
Project Name
Leader
Fuel
Texas Clean Energy Project Summit Power
Coal
Kemper County
Southern Company
Coal
Hydrogen Energy California
SCS Energy
Petcoke
FutureGen 2.0
FutureGen Alliance
Coal
WA Parish
NRG Energy
Coal
Boundary Dam
SaskPower
Coal
Size Estimated DOE Cost
MW
Cost
Share
400
$2.5B
582 $2.8/$5.6B
405
$4.0B
170
$1.7B
240
$1.0B
160
$1.0B
$450M
$270M
$408M
$1.0B
$167M
NA
Capture
Process
CO2
Use
IGCC/Polygen EOR
IGCC
EOR
IGCC/Polygen EOR
Oxy-combustion Geologic
Post Combustion EOR
Post Combustion EOR
Start-up
Location
2017
2015
2017
2017
2017
2014
Texas
Mississippi
California
Illinois
Texas
Saskatchewan
.3
First Ultra Supercritical Steam Electric Plant in
the U.S. – 675MWgross/625MWnet
Commercial operation in early 2013
750 ft
~ $2800/KWnet Plant Cost ~$1.8 Billion
Plant Efficiency ~38.5%
.4
EPA’s Clean Power Plan for Existing Plants
 EPA has identified reducing CO2 emissions from existing power plants through heat rate improvement as
the First of Four major building blocks of the Existing Plant GHG Rule. EPA projects the potential
improvement in heat rate across the fleet of existing units to be 6%.
 While the potential for efficiency increase and emissions decrease from any given plant is real through
improvements in plant operations and equipment upgrades it is in no way a given for the entire fleet of
coal plants in the US. The age of a plant, the physical condition, generating capacity, maintenance
practices, previous upgrades and plant operating mode can all impact what level of efficiency
improvement can be achieved by any given plant.
 EPA cites the January 2009 Sargent & Lundy (S&L) report “Coal-fired Power Plant Heat Rate Reductions”
as a basis for these potential improvements. The plant modifications discussed in the report may be
feasible for any given plant, but they are not necessarily additive i.e. not every improvement identified will
be applicable to every plant.
 Building Blocks 2 & 3 negate the positive effects of Building Block 1 as they suggest that coal boilers be
relegated to a lower position on the plant dispatch list in favor of more natural gas fired generation, added
nuclear capacity and more wind and solar power. Coal plants are most efficient when they can operate at
or near their full rated capacity. Low load and or cycling operation results in higher CO2 emission per
MWhr generated.
Another Option
 Replacing aging coal plants with more efficient Ultra-supercritical
plants would allow for a significant reduction in CO2 emissions
from the power generation sector. Ultra-supercritical plant designs
are commercially available today at reasonable cost. These
designs could be deployed in a CO2 capture ready condition.
 We can reduce CO2 emission now while we wait for cost effective
CO2 capture technologies to be developed.
 Given the present cost to capture CO2 no coal new coal plants will
be built if CO2 capture is a requirement. Our valuable energy
resource, coal, will be lost to the U.S. or exported to other countries
when it will likely be used in less efficient and less environmentally
friendly plant designs.
 If we are truly interested in our energy security and independence
from foreign energy sources we cannot abandon coal as a power
generation option.
Comparison of CO2 Emissions Based on Plant
Steam Cycle Design
(PRB coal, Midwest Location, Wet Cooling, Peak Operating Conditions)
Plant Design
Heat Rate
BTU/KWhr
Efficiency
CO2 Emissions
Reduction in
CO2 from Base
Subcritical
10,700
32%
2105 lbs CO2/MWhrgross
Base
Supercritical
9500
36%
1869 lbs CO2/MWhrgross
11.2%
Ultrasupercritical
8980
38%
1767 lbs CO2/MWhrgross
16.0%
7500
45.5%
1476 lbs CO2/MWhrgross
30.0%
Advanced
Ultrasupercritical
(still in
development)