«Old wells are your most likely leakage path,» Sherrick says, and there is one
old coal gas well that pierces the earth to 1,200 meters below the surface, which AEP will monitor closely.
Not exact matches
Installing enough batteries to make most electrical grids fully reliant on wind power or even to take
older natural -
gas or
coal plants off - line isn't cost effective yet in many regions.
The reasons are familiar by now: cheap natural
gas, cheap renewables, stagnant electricity demand, and
old coal plants getting outcompeted on the market.
The shortfall may grow critical as electricity producers close down
old oil and
coal plants in favor of cleaner natural
gas.
Shutting down
old coal plants is good for greenhouse
gas and other pollution, but may prove difficult for local economies
Until other energy sources supplant
coal, oil and natural
gas, the technological challenge is clear: extract maximum energy from the
old standbys while minimizing harm to the environment
Salem was an ideal test case: an
old, dirty plant in a region already shifting from
coal and oil to natural
gas.
Does it makes sense to replace
old coal - fired power plants with new natural
gas power plants today, as a bridge to a longer - term transition toward near zero - emission energy generation technologies such as solar, wind, or nuclear power?
Replacing
old coal - fired power plants with new natural
gas plants could cause climate damage to increase over the next decades, unless their methane leakage rates are very low and the new power plants are very efficient.
«If there is substantial natural
gas leakage, then building new natural
gas plants would lead to more near term climate damage than using the
old dirty
coal plants,» explained Caldeira.
In September 2005, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a United Nations organization that includes scientists from nearly every country in the world, released a report estimating that 2 trillion tons of carbon dioxide could be stored in
old coal mines, abandoned oil and
gas fields, and in various other geologic formations around the world.
Natural
gas might still have an advantage over
coal when burned to create electricity, because
gas - fired power plants tend to be newer and far more efficient than
older facilities that provide the bulk of the country's
coal - fired generation.
The UK has switched off many of its
older coal plants, and government policy means it is now cheaper to burn
gas than
coal.
However, because
gas,
coal and oil are millions of years
old, their carbon has a key difference compared to the carbon cycling through plants.
And, new power plants with the various anti-pollution technologies (and / or, in many cases using natural
gas instead of
coal) are much cleaner than the
older plants.
... In the U.S. electricity supply sector, the cost benchmark for reducing carbon dioxide emissions lies with substitution of natural
gas for
coal, especially
older, less efficient units.
An important question that political and climate analysts will be examining is how much bite is in the regulations — meaning how much they would curb emissions beyond what's already happening to cut power plant carbon dioxide thanks to the natural
gas boom, the shutdown of
old coal - burning plants because of impending mercury - cutting rules (read the valuable Union of Concerned Scientists «Ripe for Retirement» report for more on this), improved energy efficiency and state mandates developing renewable electricity supplies.
The
old energy economy, fueled by oil,
coal, and natural
gas, is being replaced with an economy powered by wind, solar, and geothermal energy.
And as the English have done and as the Chinese and the Indians and etc will still do, they will use
coal, lots of
coal plus
gas and oil for power generation until some capitalist somewhere with a very good idea on how to reduce costs and still make a fortune comes along and devises / discovers or restructures an
old technology or a new power generation technology that is more efficient, lower cost, more profitable, just as reliable as fossil fueled, those
coal, oil and
gas generators
Radioisotopes for carbon changes inform that the carbon comes from
old sequestered carbon, like oil,
gas and
coal deposits.
However, the majority of
coal - fired power stations in operation is relatively
old and emits large quantities of smoke, carbon dioxide and sulfur, making China the world's single largest emitter of greenhouse
gases globally.
Most
gas - fired capacity is less than 10 years
old, while 73 % of all
coal - fired capacity was 30 years or
older at the end of 2010.
New
gas - fired plants are starting up almost as fast as
older coal plants are shutting down.
Thus, retiring the 62 year
old Meramec
Coal Plant would go along ways toward cleaning up our local air and reducing local greenhouse
gas emissions.
You've called for installing nuclear power plants worldwide instead of
coal - fired or
gas - fired plants for all new or decommissioned
old plants.
Newer vintage natural
gas - fired units operate at higher efficiency than
older, fossil - fired units, which increases the competitiveness of natural
gas relative to
coal.
Some
older coal - fired generators were retrofitted with various environmental controls (see chart for data on installations of one type of control, the flue
gas desulfurization unit, also called FGD or scrubber).
Cheaper natural
gas has pushed out
older, less - efficient
coal and oil generation; however, the region's increasing overreliance on natural
gas will provide few additional emissions benefits and increases risks of price volatility or supply disruption.
That meant
coal burned in newer supercritical plants, natural
gas, nuclear, tire burning, and existing 50 - year -
old hydroelectric plants all counted — and they already made up more than two - thirds of supply.
As the owners of
older coal plants consider whether to retire them or upgrade them to meet new and emerging environmental standards, the threat of greenhouse
gas regulation will be an overlay of uncertainty and possible large expense, on top of the burdens imposed by other new and proposed environmental regulations and the competition from natural
gas.
Not only that,
older coal and natural
gas plants are being shuttered.
«Big oil,
gas, and
coal have huge influence on politicians and governments and they get that influence the
old fashioned way — they buy it,» said Kretzmann.
BNEF expects the nation's
coal - power capacity in 2040 will be about half of what it is now after
older plants come offline and are replaced by cheaper and less - polluting sources such as
gas and renewables.
The reason: Since 2012, carbon pollution from the states» traditionally
coal - heavy power sectors has dropped significantly, as new
gas power plants have replaced
older, less efficient
coal plants.
Scores of
old, inefficient
coal - fired power plants were already expected to close as a result of other air pollution regulations — with
gas fired plants popping up in their place.
He managed to find a note of optimism in the more efficient
coal power fleet that will remain after 68,000 MW of
old capacity retires by 2020, under pressure from various regulations and competition from natural
gas.
We are going to need, for example, as we move away from
old coal - based systems to a fully renewable systems we will need, in many locations, to have natural
gas come in to provide backup or provide peaking power for occasions when variable electricity and power from renewables isn't available.
Natural
gas combined - cycle units operate at higher efficiency than do
older,
coal - fired units, which increases the competitiveness of natural
gas relative to
coal.
The UK has lots of
coal,
gas and nuclear plants that are getting
old.
■ Some 14,000 MW of new — mostly
gas combined cycle — generation has replaced
older coal - and oil - fired generating capacity, a private investment of about $ 14 billion.
Hydro serves most of the «
old load» from our buildings and industry, but any new load is served by
coal and
gas - fired generation, so it's fair to place new construction in Oregon up there with North Dakota.
The study found that the EPA rules, combined with a recent drop in the price of natural
gas, could over the next four to five years cause the utility industry to accelerate retirement of
old coal - fired power plants rather than spend to upgrade the plants» emissions controls.
The Government is keen to see new
gas plants built as a cleaner replacement for
old coal plants, which it wants to shut by 2025.
Goals like these are especially notable to the extent that they would supplant even natural
gas, which is abundant, cheap, flexible and widely used to replace
old coal plants as they become uneconomic and shut down.
Think of this energy storage tank of potential solar power as akin to the pile of
coal outside an
old coal plant, or to the underground cavern full of natural
gas waiting to be burned up above ground in the nearby power plant.
The rise of cheap and plentiful shale natural
gas is hastening the fall of
older,
coal - fired power plants.
This has coincided with the unplanned withdrawal of
older coal and
gas - fired generators.»
Older coal plants will continue to be hamstrung by the cost of complying with non-climate pollution rules (such as the ozone air quality standards), plus the perhaps even lower price of natural
gas.
Alabama Power, taking advantage of a drop in the price for natural
gas, already has announced that it plans to convert
older coal - fired units at the Shelby County plant to
gas, which burns far cleaner than
coal.
The sharp drop from 2012/13 was caused by the EU's Large Combustion Plant Directive forcing
older coal (and a few
gas) plants to close or limit their hours.