Press Releases
April 15, 2008
Contact: Lawrence Pacheco (202) 715-1555
FutureGen chairman urges House panel not to abandon progress at Mattoon
WASHINGTON, D.C. – FutureGen at Mattoon is further along than any other project in the world to advance near-zero emission coal-fueled power technology with carbon capture and sequestration and the nation cannot afford to abandon this progress to a restructured program proposed by the Department of Energy, FutureGen Alliance Chairman Paul Thompson told a House panel today.
"One of the most important aspects of FutureGen at Mattoon is the very real progress it has already made, with five years of demonstrated successes. This includes site selection, conceptual design, cost estimates, and addressing the complex liability, regulatory, and site geology issues," Thompson testified during a hearing in the House Science and Technology Committee. "In addition, a near 2,000-page final environmental impact statement is complete. It will take years for new projects to go through this process."
In a Senate hearing last week, DOE acknowledged that their new plan would result in at least two years delay, although, many believe the delay is likely five years or more and new projects would have to start from scratch.
When operational, FutureGen at Mattoon will capture and permanently store more than 1 million tons of CO2 and capture 90 percent of its carbon emissions. In addition, as a nonprofit enterprise that includes unprecedented international participation, the Alliance would be in the position to share information from the project, which would facilitate deployment of commercial, near-zero emission power plants throughout the world. DOE has cited higher costs as a reason for restructuring the FutureGen program. Thompson noted that the cost of all global energy infrastructure projects has increased due to inflation, and the costs for FutureGen at Mattoon are consistent with industry average increases. DOE is proposing up to three smaller projects for less money, but energy experts believe three well designed projects would cost a minimum of $4 billion, significantly more than the cost of FutureGen at Mattoon.
Thompson said early action to advance the technology is a good national policy.
"An under-funded approach to such a massively complex problem using several small projects attached to commercial ventures did not make sense for landing men on the moon and it does not make sense for solving the climate change challenge," said Thompson." Investing a few billion on the front-end to advance the technology is a sound national investment. FutureGen at Mattoon should proceed and so should other complementary, adequately funded projects."
View Thompson's full testimony (PDF).
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About the FutureGen Alliance
The FutureGen Alliance, a non-profit organization, represents some of the world's largest coal companies and electric utilities including: American Electric Power, Anglo American, BHP Billiton, the China Huaneng Group, CONSOL Energy Inc., E.ON U.S., Foundation Coal, Luminant, PPL Corporation, Rio Tinto Energy America, Peabody Energy, Southern Company, and Xstrata Coal.. These companies provide energy to tens of millions of residential, business, and industrial customers in North America, Asia, Australia, Europe, Africa and South America. The Alliance is partnering with the U.S. Department of Energy to design and build the facility. Learn more about FutureGen and the Alliance at http://www.FutureGenAlliance.org/.