goatchze said:

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Zobel said:

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None of the major power companies are making coal plants any more. GE, Siemens, etc. have announced no new-build.

Renewables and gas turbines have a symbiotic relationship that targets coal. The cyclic nature of renewables matches well with the fast-start / fast-ramp capability of gas turbines to create and then shave ramp peak price events away from coal. Advanced combined cycle gas turbines are cheaper to build and operate than coal in the US.

Given the state of the market today, and the foreseeable future - regulatory, fuel price, technology, etc - coal is dead and not coming back.

Worth reading.
https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-electricity-2020

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Combined cycle is a key differentiator for gas. Natural gas already has a lower CO2 level per BTU as compared to coal, but combined cycle effectively doubles the efficiency of the plant, reducing it further. Throw in how easy it is to remove mercury and sulfur from natural gas before combustion, natural gas combined cycle is attractive on both an economic and environmental level.

If you look at EIA's Annual Energy Outlook, they're projecting almost all new thermal builds to be natural gas combined cycle for the next 30 years.

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Thank you for the information, looked up what combined cycle meant, impressive.

COMBINED CYCLE POWER PLANT: HOW IT WORKS

Integrated Coal Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) Power Plants

AggieDub14 said:

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bmks270 said:

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Clean coal technology will make a comeback.

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What about clean asbestos?

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Most asbestos is absolutely harmless and still used in products and used widely throughout the world.

Unlike libs, some portion of the population has the ability to educated ourselves on products and safe use of "evil" products despite what Jim Adler and late night informercials on mesothelioma tells you.

Friable asbestos is the primary concern and what results in the full PPE and extensive disposal requirements. Non-friable asbestos means it can not easily be disturbed into small fibers that you breathe in. So yes, as a matter of fact, there is "clean asbestos".

Back to coal. I am going to make an assumption that you have never personally visited a clean coal plant, seen the scrubbers in action, talked to the plant manager and other experts working in plant that monitor air quality. If you did, or even bothered to educate yourself, you would observe that the plant shows no smoke plume and any "smoke" you see from a clean coal plant will be on a cold day and its commonly referred to as water vapor.

You would walkthrough the the area with the scrubbers and learn how they work and the resulting fly ash which can be used in other products. Finally, you would see the coal trains from Wyoming coming to Texas as their coal naturally burns more efficiently and is mixed with coal sourced from next to the plant.

So the snarky comment made about "clean asbestos" is as factually incorrect about people who determined from their Dem overlords that coal is bad.

I don't have an axe to grind against anything.

GE - no new coal
https://www.ge.com/news/press-releases/ge-pursue-exit-new-build-coal-power-market

Siemens - no new coal
https://www.power-eng.com/emissions/siemens-energy-announces-immediate-exit-from-new-coal-projects/

Toshiba - no new coal
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Environment/Toshiba-stops-taking-orders-for-coal-fired-power-plants

The Mitsubishi Corporation (the trading company, not Mitsubishi Heavy Industries or Power) is under a lot of pressure to stop participating in coal projects, with a recent cancellation in Vietnam being the result. Japanese investors are all in a hissy fit about financing coal projects.

In the US coal is more expensive to run and build than combined cycle gas turbines, and will be for the foreseeable future. It is also less flexible and suffers more from increased renewables penetration. There are no coal plants under construction in the US right now. There are no forecasted coal plants in the US through 2050 and many operators are phasing out their coal plants altogether.

This is a dispassionate analysis. Regardless of what you want, or what I want, this is the reality of the situation.