AEP Hires Bechtel, GE Energy for Clean Coal Design
Date: 30-Sep-05
Country: USA
Author: Leonard Anderson
AEP said engineering and design would take 10 months to a year, after which it would make a decision on construction based on regulatory progress and cost forecasts.
AEP, the largest electricity generator in the United States, said its goal is to have one clean-coal plant in Ohio completed by 2010. It intends to have at least another 600 megawatt in clean-coal generating capacity in its eastern utility area by 2013, AEP said.
China also is considering developing a clean-coal plant, Michael Morris, AEP's chairman, president and chief executive, said in an interview.
"China's power plants are mostly coal fired and they are very interested in the clean-coal technology," Morris said.
AEP is part of a group of big US utilities and coal producers working with the US Department of Energy to lead the development of the first "near-zero emissions" coal-fired power station.
The group, called the FutureGen Industrial Alliance, has had talks with the China Huaneng Group, an energy company engaged in coal-fueled generation.
Utilities like AEP and Cinergy Corp. are stepping up plans to develop power plants based on "integrated gasification combined cycle," or IGCC.
Cincinnati-based Cinergy, which is being acquired by Duke Energy Corp., said last week it will begin engineering and design of an IGCC power plant in Indiana in a partnership with gas and electric utility Vectren Corp.
Like AEP, Cinergy will work with General Electric and privately held Bechtel on the project.
An IGCC plant could turn coal to gas, removing sulfur dioxide and other emissions at the front end of the electricity production process before the gas is used to fuel a turbine generator.
The IGCC technology is said to use less water and produce fewer emissions than a conventional coal-fired plant and has the potential to remove mercury and carbon dioxide at a lower cost.
"IGCC is the answer for the question of how to continue to use an abundant supply of coal to produce electricity efficiently and clean up pollutants," Morris said.
"It's less complicated and more cost effective to remove the gases at the front end of power production instead of trying to clean up emissions going up the plant stacks."
AEP, based in Columbus, Ohio, also will consider IGCC projects outside the Midwest in Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma where it operates regional utilities, he added.
(Additional reporting by Ben Berkowitz in New York)
