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1. Coal Gasification Startup Laurus Energy Raises Funds
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2. Obama Names Green Team, Calls for New Energy Economy
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3. Enel to Start Up Two Geothermal Plants in Nevada
Coal Gasification Startup Laurus Energy Raises Funds
Katie Fehrenbacher - Startups
Helping to produce more coal to run turbines and power plants sure doesn’t sound like a clean aim, but a startup called Laurus Energy says its coal gasification technology can produce a gas that releases less carbon when burned than natural gas and costs between $2 and $3 per unit — about half the price of natural gas these days. And the promise of a cheaper, cleaner-burning fossil fuel has attracted just shy of $10 million in Series A investment from Mohr Davidow Ventures, the companies announced Tuesday morning.
Laurus’ technology, called Underground Coal Gasification, turns coal deep in the earth into syngas. The syngas is extracted and sold to be used for power generation; meanwhile the carbon emitted during the gasification process can be sold to enhanced oil recovery companies (there’s fossil fuel all over this green business model). Erik Straser, a partner with Mohr Davidow who led the investment, says the idea is to use natural gas — which he calls the champagne of fossil fuels — for necessary processes like home cooking, and use cheaper coal syngas for power production in turbines.
Another aspect that interested Straser is how cheaply the Laurus process can gasify the coal underground. Straser says the company hadn’t pursued any surface gasification processes, which could be on the order of, say, $2 billion, but that Laurus can do the equivalent in the coal seam for one twentieth of that price. He adds that since the underground gasification process leaves char and other “really nasty stuff” in the ground, it’s a cleaner process than extracting coal and gasifying it above ground.
Environmentalists, though, will be all over the fact that Laurus’ process also enables coal that couldn’t be mined to be extracted via gasification. Straser says it could add access to up to nine times more coal reserves than available to traditional means. Can helping add more coal to the power generation supply ever be a green idea? Even if the coal gas emits less carbon than burning natural gas? It’s not great, but it could be a first step toward reducing power plant emissions.
The 3-year-old Laurus’ underground gasification technology actually stems from Montréal-based Ergo Exergy, which has commercialized underground coal gasification projects in India, South Africa, Australia and Uzbekistan. The founder of Ergo Exergy, Michael Blinderman, is also co-founder of Laurus, along with Simon Maev. Laurus has an exclusive license to use the technology in North America.
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Obama Names Green Team, Calls for New Energy Economy
Katie Fehrenbacher - Policy
Calling a new energy frontier a “leading priority of my presidency,” President-elect Barack Obama, as expected, on Monday afternoon in Chicago named the four key members of his cabinet that will make up America’s next green team: Steven Chu as Energy Secretary, Carol Browner as Climate Czar, Lisa Jackson as Environmental Protection Agency Administrator, and Nancy Sutley as head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
Many will be unfamiliar with the new team members, but rest assured that together they bring a considerable amount of experience from various levels of government and represent a major change from the efforts of the current administration when it comes to climate change and the environment. Chu, a physicist who has headed up Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for the past four years, received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997 for creating technology to cool and trap atoms with lasers; Browner was the former administrator of the EPA under President Clinton; Jackson is the former head of New Jersey's environmental agency, and Sutley is the Los Angeles deputy mayor for energy and the environment.
As Obama announced the team, he also reiterated his belief that environmentally sound policies and solid economic ones do not contradict one another, and that a new energy economy is going to help stimulate the economy and create jobs (green stimulus?). He was specifically asked if he would allow California to regulate greenhouse gases, and if he would allow the offshore drilling moratorium to lapse. He said that California has consistently hit the bar on energy issues, while the rest of the nation has followed; he also said he didn’t want to let the offshore drilling ban slide, unless it’s part of a larger energy strategy.
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Enel to Start Up Two Geothermal Plants in Nevada
David Ehrlich - Big Green
Italy’s Enel is boosting its power in the U.S. geothermal market, announcing today that it will flip the switch on two of its geothermal plants in Nevada, with a total capacity of 65 megawatts, in the first quarter of next year. The Stillwater and Salt Wells plants are expected to generate enough energy to power 40,000 homes in the region.
Enel said it has more than 150 MW of geothermal power under development in the U.S.; in addition to the two plants in Nevada, it also has a plant in California and one in Utah. Enel also has 231 MW of wind and 21 MW of biomass in operation in the U.S.
Enel acquired the geothermal plants in March 2007 with its acquisition of AMP Resources, for which it paid $90 million, plus certain milestone payments. The Stillwater site is actually an expansion of an existing plant, which is currently generating 7 MW of power. The expansion will be part of the 65 MW to be generated next year, but the company did not disclose what the individual capacity of Stillwater or Salt Wells will be.
Enel operates 31 geothermal plants in Tuscany generating about 700 MW of electricity, including the first geothermal power generator demonstrated in Larderello, in Tuscany, in 1904.
Enel said it’s also developing geothermal plants in South America, working with Chile’s Empresa Nacional del Petróleo to explore areas that the company claims show potential capacity in excess of 100 MW. Enel built its first geothermal plant abroad in El Salvador, with a capacity of 44 MW.
Enel said it’s also looking into the next generation of geothermal technologies, and in October the company’s North America unit and its partners received $1 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Energy for research, development and demonstration of enhanced geothermal systems. Under that grant, Enel North America will work with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New England Research to apply techniques for reservoir and fracture characterization at Enel’s geothermal site in Utah.
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