HRL’s new coal technology to lower carbon dioxide emissions intensity

Download the PDF version of this document: HRL’s new coal technology to lower carbon dioxide emissions intensity

Using technology developed in Victoria by Australian technology company HRL, a consortium of local and international interests have come together to build and operate a A$1.1 billion, 600MW demonstration plant expected to produce power with about 30 per cent less carbon dioxide emissions than current Victorian best practice in brown coal generation plants.

The project, Dual Gas, utilises ‘integrated drying and gasification combined cycle’ or IDGCC technology. The technology was developed over more than 15 years by the Australian-owned energy, technology and project development company HRL, with in excess of A$140 million research and development expenditure. The technology has significant worldwide export potential.

Planned to be operational by 2013/2014, the new power station will be significantly smaller in physical size than current conventional brown coal power stations of similar generation capacity. “The HRL Dual Gas project is an important development step in the commercialisation of the IDGCC technology,” said Dr Alf Ottrey, Dual Gas’s Manager Business Development.

Demonstrating Victorian innovation on a near commercial scale, this project is designed to prepare IDGCC technology for commercial deployment locally and potentially internationally – aligning investment objectives with market needs, alongside the growing global urgency to tackle climate change.

The IDGCC technology involves the drying and gasification of high moisture content reactive coals, such as brown coal, to produce power at a higher efficiency than current conventional brown coal power plants.

The groundbreaking technology has undergone extensive research and development, including a 10MW-scale facility in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley which successfully generated electricity into the grid.

The proposed Dual Gas power station in the Latrobe Valley will demonstrate the new IDGCC technology at near to full-scale, commercial level. The HRL technology provides a pathway towards the more efficient use of the vast coal resources in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley, which is the major source of Victoria’s energy supply.

Large reductions in carbon dioxide emissions are important to the future of power generation in the Latrobe Valley and vital to the Victorian Government’s commitment to reducing greenhouse emissions from power generation.

The Victorian Government has committed A$50 million to the project as part of its Energy Technology Innovation Strategy (ETIS). This strategy is a major component of the State Government’s response to climate change as well as demonstrating world’s best low-emissions technology power generation using Latrobe Valley brown coal.

Leveraging from the ETIS grant, HRL attracted a further A$100 million from the Australian Federal Government’s Low Emissions Technology Demonstration Fund (LETDF) for the construction of the new power station.

“The grant funding available under the ETIS and LETDF schemes provides support and encouragement to investment in the demonstration of new technology projects,” Dr Ottrey said.

Large-scale demonstration projects, such as Dual Gas, partly funded through the ETIS program all have elements of technical risk to overcome. Securing government support has assisted the company’s strategy to progress this technology towards becoming commercially ready.

In advancing its new IDGCC technology, HRL has capitalised on growing government support to tackle climate change in a local energy context, sustained largely by low cost brown coal. And with the accelerated international push to tackle climate change, IDGCC is well-placed as a front-running technology likely to be adopted to address the world’s growing energy demand.

For further information or assistance, contact:

Energy Technology Innovation
Department of Primary Industries
1 Spring Street (GPO Box 4440)
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia 3001
Telephone +61 3 9658 4193
Facsimile +61 3 9658 4915
Email dpi.etis@dpi.vic.gov.au
Website www.dpi.vic.gov.au/etis