ENERGY BREAKTHROUGH: MIT proposes gasification fuel cell coal plants to get to 60% efficiency which is double pulverized coal efficiency. Buy combining two well-known technologies, coal gasification and fuel cells, the new systems can produce 60% of the heat generated by the coal as electricity. This compares with 33% efficiency in Australia’s current conventional coal plants, or the best modern “ultra-supercritical” coal plants in China of 45%:
Ultracritical coal reactor turbines in China
Upgrading Australia’s coal plants to this new technology would almost double the power produced, from the same amount of coal. Even upgrading to the type of stations being installed in China would increase power by 50% on the same coal. By the way, this is easily the most cost-effective way to reduce Australia’s CO2 emissions, if one were dopey enough to believe that that mattered.
UPDATE: Meanwhile the Green’s Mr Bandt today called for the Australian government to immediately begin phasing out coal-fired power stations, for “fiddling while the planet is burning”. Liberal MP Michael Sukkar said he thinks this “is just code for ultimately pushing up electricity prices.” The Greens want more windmills:
- Wind farms — are 96% useless, and cost 150 times more than necessary for what they do
- Wind Farms: Turbines break like match-sticks in medium waves, and their capacity is “overestimated”
- OK to kill endangered birds? Yes if you are a windfarm. Greens seem to be fine with that.
- Wind Turbines useless for carbon reduction — From $50 – $120 ton. Greens should hate them!
- Let’s copy Germany: 23,000 wind towers make 7% of its electricity to stop 0 degrees of warming
- Germany’s Wind Power Meltdown. Some 800,000 German homes have been disconnected from the grid – victims of what is euphemistically called “fuel poverty”. German manufacturers faced with escalating power bills are packing up and heading to the USA – where power prices are 1/3 of Germany’s.
But as we pointed out on the Wentworth Report yesterday, windmills and the attendant government money are Germany’s new “Green Sleaze”, making headlines about corruption in the most prestigious German media. Hmmm, lots of government money for someone, building all those windmills. By the way, if you want to short this nonsense there is now the Cool Futures Hedge Fund, almost ready for business.
hat-tip Matthew
