THE STRANGE CASE FOR CTL

Originally posted May 5.
“So much coal, so little to do with it,” many of the world’s most energy hungry countries –including China and the U.S. – keep muttering. And then somebody like Institut Francais du Petrole President Olivier Appert comes along encouraging them by whispering, “CTL, sweet CTL!”

Yet even Appert feels constrained to point out the shortcomings of planning on a coal-to-liquids (CTL) transportation fuel in a carbon constrained world faced with global climate change: "…it is clear that we need to consider seriously the different constraints [on] coal production: [the] environmental issue and technological and financial challenges."

Is coal clean? No way. Diesel from coal: 850 gm CO2/mile; Diesel from oil: 500 gm CO2/mile. Not much better than plain old gasoline. And coal uses LOTS more water.

Maybe it’s cheaper? Hah. CTL oil is about $67 to $82/barrel – before the cost of carbon-capture-and-sequestration – if anybody ever successfully does it – is figured in.

It worked somewhat in Germany and Japan during World War II – because they used slave labor and weren’t concerned with emissions. But it didn’t work all THAT well, based on the war’s outcome.

All together, it makes a pretty strange case for what Appert says will be “…part of the solution to the dramatic challenges of energy and environment the world is facing.”

A somewhat legitimate excuse for CTL might be that of the U.S. Air Force. The U.S. political leadership’s misguided commitment to ethanol leaves the USAF without a certain future source of high octane jet fuel. Ethanol can't be refined into high octane jet fuel from ethanol. It could come from coal.

That’s why NewEnergyNews believes the best biofuel research and development project is not CTL but algae. Algae is grown on noncrop land and uses almost entirely recycled water. Growing it does not pollute the land with fertilizers and pesticides. More relevantly, it can be refined into anything petroleum can be refined into, including high octane jet fuel. It also yields immensely more energy per acre than ethanol but does not require environment-devastating mining like coal.

And algae literally eats CO2 emissions for lunch.

Compared to other options, it comes with a lot of greenhouse gas emissions - if that matters to anybody. (click to enlarge)

CTL deemed ‘credible’ fuel option despite drawbacks
Doris Leblond, April 15, (Oil & Gas Journal)

WHO
Olivier Appert, President, Institut Francais du Petrole (IFP); Alain Quignard, new project/motor fuel resources manager, IFP; Brian Ricketts, coal analyst, International Energy Agency (IEA); Jerzy Buzek, former Prime Minister, Poland; William Anderson, assistant secretary, U.S. Air Force (USAF)

The basic idea. The idea that lost WWII for Germany and Japan. (click to enlarge)

WHAT
Appert discussed the possibilities of developing a coal-to-liquids fuel to replace petroleum-based liquid fuel to conclude the World Coal-to-Liquids Conference in Paris Apr. 4.

WHEN
- China Shenshua CTL plant coming online in 2008.
- IEA sees CTL as no more than 15% of transport fuel market before 2050, more likely 10%, but growing between 2020 and 2030 as cheap oil runs out.

click to enlarge

WHERE
- Coal-rich countries wishfully studying CTL: China, the US, Australia, Indonesia, India, Germany.
- China Shenshua CTL plant is in Inner Mongolia.

WHY
- 2 methods of liquification: (1) direct liquefaction, with hydrogen added to organic structure; (2) indirect liquefaction through break down by steam gasification.
- The USAF is reaching out to the UK’s Royal Air Force and France’s Air Force to develop alternative sources for high octane jet fuel.

click to enlarge

QUOTES
- Alain Quignard, new project/motor fuel resources manager, IFP: "It is cheaper than extraheavy oil production…From coal onwards, one finds the refining processes applied to heavy oil and deep conversion products."
- Jerzy Buzek, former Prime Minister, Poland: "[Poland is]…resolving a coal conversion dilemma: whether to use coal as power for electricity or only for liquid fuels."
- William Anderson, USAF: "…for Air Forces across the world…fuel needs to be international…"