Cool Water IGCC plant

Fig. 7.4. Cool water IGCC plant (after Plumley [4]).

Extensive emission data are available on slag from the Cool Water IGCC plant. Table 4-6 summarizes RCRA test results (6). Scientists have also performed long-term leaching tests on coal gasification slag (19). 

M.J. Gluckman, et al. "A Reconciliation of the Cool Water IGCC Plant Performance and Cost Data with Equivalent Projections for a Mature 360 MW Commercial IGCC Facility." In Proceedings of the Seventh Annual EPRI Conference on Coal Gasification. Palo Alto, California Electric Power Research Institute, October 1988. AP-6007-SR. 

Plant locations can also create extremes in permitted air emissions. For example, the Cool Water IGCC power generation facility in Southern California had to meet emission levels significantly lower than those which new coal-based power plants have to meet under the NSPS (6). Issues such as best available control technology, prevention of significant deterioration, and nonattainment area tend to drive permitted air emissions to extremely low levels. In addition, various provisions of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 favor new power plants to have lower air emissions than specified by the NSPS. These are discussed in more detail at the end of this section. 

Table 4-1 summarizes air emission data for the Cool Water IGCC electric power generation demonstration facility (6). The table includes actual air emissions as well as local permitted levels and the federal NSPS for new coal-fired power plants. It also shows results for both low-sulfur and high-sulfur coals. 

EPRI was the largest financial contributor to the Cool Water IGCC demonstration plant. The Institute has published numerous reports and technical papers of the plant s design, construction, operations, and performance (42-48). The Cool Water accomplishments are summarized in detail in Section 3. 

The first option is to remove the ammonia from the fuel gas before combustion. The advantage of ammonia removal at this stage is that the volume of the gas leaving the gasifier is much smaller than the flue gas volume. Conventional ammonia removal methods, involving condensation and absorption in water, may be used in biomass IGCC plants. These methods are associated with cooling and potential loss of sensible heat from the gas. Also the absorbed ammonia has to be disposed of. 

IGCC technology was first successfully demonstrated on a commercial scale at the Cool Water Project in Southern California from 1984 to 1989. Since then, roughly a dozen IGCC plants have been built, most of them running on refinery residues rather than coal. 

Water effluents are not a problem in coal gasification plants. In fact, water effluents may create fewer problems for IGCC than for direct combustion-based power generation because the steam cycle in an IGCC plant produces less than 40% of the power plant s power. Therefore, the water effluents from boiler feedwater preparation and cooling-water blowdown are significantly less than those for steam < cle-based power generation with direct coal combustion. 

Distinguishing Characteristics. The key advantage of the Texaco coal gasification technology is the extensive operating experience at full commercial scale. Furthermore, Cool Water is an IGCC power generation facility, operated by conventional electric utility staff and is one of the cleanest coal-fired power plants in the world. 

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