Anhydrous Ammonia to replace Coal
Possible Solutions November 5th, 2007Sunday, November 5, 2007 in the Dominion Post, my town’s city newspaper, there was a guest commentary by Paul Brown, a man who occasionally posts on a listserv I manage for a non-profit organization that has been fighting a power plant in our town called Longview for several years. Observe these contrasts, unlike most news organizations that allow people to freely view their content online, I can’t link to Paul’s guest commentary because despite the fact that DP is making out well on its newspaper, it wants to make more money by requiring people to pay for an online subscription, even those receiving the paper edition. Unlike most non-WV cities that have been beset with the prospects of having a traditional coal-burning plant built right besides the city, and who have repelled the proposal even before it could gain momentum, our town has failed in preventing its realization primarily because certain parties like the Economic Development Authority, County Commission, and School Board embraced the prospect because of all the money they could receive. Well don’t even get me started about Longview, but the point is that people in WV, even highly educated Morgantown just don’t get the long view and insist on the only industry that WV has ever really cared about, they just don’t get it, Dominion Post included, that you can actually make money by doing the right thing.
That’s the premise in Paul Brown’s article titled, If coals the future, our future’s short. The part of his article that interested me the most wasn’t the reality I understand too well, but an innovative solution that even the Energy Industry in WV could transition into. I hold that old industries can be reborn either by investing in new technologies or embracing new approaches, they could do this all while improving the economy, adding jobs and saving the environment. All it really involves is a change of attitude. You know the old adage, “People are afraid of what they don’t understand.” I really think this is the implicit problem that exists in the West Virginia because ignorance is our undoing and the reason why we rank low in just about everything in the Nation.
Anhydrous Ammonia (NH3) presents one such solution according to Paul. Here’s his summary of a conference he attended:
Last week, I attended a conference in which researchers reported making ammonia using electricity from wind, hydroelectric, and ocean thermal power. They’ve fabricated base metal catalysts that can be used to promote smooth combustion, e.g., in power plants. There were also reports on fuel cells and internal combustion engines which can run on ammonia, and a kit to convert gasoline vehicles to ammonia hybrids. I had a chance to see how ammonia is handled and how safe it is.
One Source
In WV, poultry farming is its largest agricultural business, and one of the largest in the United States, so this is one good example of how finding readily available sources of ammonia wouldn’t be difficult while at the same time reducing effluents into the environment. This all assumes that the agriculture business itself would rely on green practices so that there would not be trade-offs that could better be met by being a vegetarian. Ofcourse, being a vegetarian can have its trade-offs if the food is not produced in a sustainable way.
Where we are now
I did a little research and found that the Apollo Fuel cell relies on NH3 that is broken down with an Ammonia Cracker into Hydrogen and Nitrogen (air consists of 78% nitrogen). They say “The Company believes that this is the best way to produce hydrogen for a fuel cell. Ammonia is produced throughout the world in large volume, around 105 million tons a year, and is used for agriculture and refrigeration.” One vehicle manufacturer called Zap has an exclusive contract with Apollo to use these green Fuel Cells. Zap says that Ammonia gas stations will be competitive with Fossil Fuel gas stations. However, in the power industry I found out that Ammonia can be used to capture CO2 and there’s a partnership between Alstrom and American Energy Power to test a validation plant in New Haven, WV, but this relies on the unsustainable fuel we know well as coal. The whole point of using ammonia is that chemically it has more Hydrogen packed per a unit of measurement than Hydrogen, and you can get it from many renewable sources. Note that this is quite a different goal than the one so happily touted by the DOE’s PowerGen. Paul talks about how stored ammonia could be burned in converted fossil fuel-fired power plants. BP and GE are jointly working on Hydrogen powered plants, although these plants haven’t completely freed themselves from non-renewable fuels as a source of Hydrogen; they do provide a demonstration of how Hydrogen plants of the near future will be a viable alternative.
In Conclusion
This is an ongoing story, but the fact that it has been shown that hydrogen can be derived from available sources of renewable Ammonia, it would be foolhardy to continue to believe that we must continue using carbon-based fuels. While many can’t free themselves from the concept that Hydrogen must come from the coal and petroleum industry, this seems primarily due to how the industry presents their perspective to the public. In WV that perspective tends to be embraced for reasons I mentioned earlier. Perhaps, right here in Morgantown, Longview will eventually get the picture, and end up using Ammonia generated in WV rather than “business as usual” coal.
November 19th, 2007 at 1:09 pm
The following is a copy of the Paul Brown commentary.
Publication:The Dominion Post; Date:Nov 4, 2007; Section:Opinion; Page Number:28
GUEST COMMENTARY
If coal’s the future, our future’s short
BY PAUL BROWN
Have you noticed the flurry of optimism from the coal industry? WVU faculty are singing that coal is here to stay. The industry is actually running scared. The latest assessments by climate experts give us 10 to 20 years before global warming is beyond our control. States and other countries are banning coal-fired power plants and turning to renewable electricity.
There’s a point where denial is irresponsible and immoral. We’ve passed that point, and it can only be explained by a deeply corrupt industry and government. I took a proposal to end global warming to staffers of energy and environmental committee chairs on Capitol Hill last month. With the exception of a [Rep. Alan] Mollohan staffer, these dedicated people were unanimous in their interest and in their despair over right-wing corruption. My proposal argues we have 20 years to stop runaway warming. In five years we must stop burning carbon, increase surface reflection of sunlight,and sequester CO2 as wood by harvesting trees at the ends of their rapid growth phases. Instead of burning carbon for energy, we must use non-carbon renewable (green) energy to generate electricity, and use some of that electricity to make green fuel.
The only feasible green fuel is anhydrous ammonia (NH3). It’s stored in pressurized tanks as a liquid, like propane. It’s not explosive and it doesn’t leak through vessel walls like hydrogen, and it has a much higher energy density per gallon, about half that of gasoline.
Last week, I attended a conference in which researchers reported making ammonia using electricity from wind, hydroelectric, and ocean thermal power. They’ve fabricated base metal catalysts that can be used to promote smooth combustion, e.g., in power plants. There were also reports on fuel cells and internal combustion engines which can run on ammonia, and a kit to convert gasoline vehicles to ammonia hybrids. I had a chance to see how ammonia is handled and how safe it is.
Ammonia has been synthesized using electricity, water and the nitrogen in air. Oxygen is released into the air in the process. When ammonia is burned, it uses the released oxygen and produces useable energy, water and nitrogen. There are no greenhouse gases or waste products that interact with the ecosystem the way there are with all carbon-based fuels. Nothing needs to be sequestered.
The demise of the carbon economy is assured by the fact that we can now have a steady supply of electricity from a fluctuating supply of wind, sun, waves and tides. We only need an excess generating capacity over the average demand for electricity. During periods of oversupply, we will make and store ammonia. During undersupply, we’ll burn the stored ammonia in converted fossil fuel-fired power plants. We no longer need fossil fuels for times when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing.
Our former university president and vice president for research, our provost, the dean of the College of Engineering, and individual engineering faculty don’t want to hear about global warming or a noncarbon energy economy. In the 33 years I’ve been a faculty member, WVU has never led in any area of technology.
Our state has missed out on the revolutions in semiconductors, computers, molecular biology and bioengineering, which have made other states rich. We’ve stuck with coal, and we’re the second-poorest state in the country. We could have had a world-class scientist as president, one who knows a lot about global warming. Instead we hired a lobbyist.
PAUL BROWN is a professor of physiology at WVU and author of ‘‘Notes from a Dying Planet.’’ He lives in Morgantown. This commentary should be considered another point of view and not necessarily the opinion or editorial policy of The Dominion Post.
November 19th, 2007 at 2:58 pm
Thanks, Troy!