Zeus Virtual Energy Library - Zeus Technology Magazine

Editor's Letter

CCS Make or Break Time

[2010/06/22]

Dear Reader,

Carbon Capture & Sequestration (CCS) may save the global coal-fired generation business – over the long-term. Coal-fired electricity is cheap, but it is also dirty. Therein lies a conundrum that flashes through the minds of policy-makers worldwide.

Should we outlaw coal? Should we mandate CO2 capture for coal-based power generation? Should we implement a tax on coal-generated power? All good questions. ... Read more

Biomass

Solar-Aided Synfuel Production

2010/06/22

A research team at Sandia National Laboratories (Sandia) in Albuquerque, N.M., is developing a process to generate some of the components for synthetic fuels (synfuels) from carbon-containing gases by using a solar-powered device called the Counter Rotating Ring Receiver Reactor Recuperator (CR5), according to a June 2 New Scientist report . ... Read more

NRC Conducts Major Alternative Fuel Project

2010/06/22

The National Research Council -Canada (NRC) has dedicated 30 researchers and CA$5 million (US$4.79 million) to an algal biofuel research project in Halifax, Nova Scotia, according to a June 8 DailyTech article and a June 4 NRC news release. ... Read more

Bioenergy Can Replace Petroleum in Kenya

2010/06/22

Agriculture waste in Kenya has the capacity to replace the country’s dependence on foreign oil, according to a June 7 TheBioenergySite.com report citing a to-be-released article in Renewable Energy that references a study by the Netherlands’ Wageningen University (Wageningen) environmental technologist Henri Spanjers and Dutch, Belgian and Kenyan researchers. ... Read more

Carbon Management

CCS in South Africa – Norway Assists

2010/06/22

Key South African ministers have reaffirmed that the country will continue to use coal and other fossil fuels to provide energy for the foreseeable future and carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology must be deployed to make their consumption more environmentally sustainable and address the "issues of the green economy," according to a June 4 Mining Weekly report. ... Read more

CCS Viability Debate

2010/06/22

Fossil fuels are an important part of U.S. domestic energy consumption and - with the expectation that fossil fuel production will continue well into the 21st century -- carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology will be needed to stabilize and ultimately reduce carbon concentrations and their effects on the environment, according to various updates the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), part of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), has added to the DOE website (http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/sequestration/overview.html). ... Read more

Coal Gasification

Coal Gasification Notes

2010/06/22

Linc Energy’s UCG Generator 4 -Australia ... Read more

DME/Methanol/GTL

DME/Methanol/GTL Notes

2010/06/22

Chemrec BioDME ... Read more

LNG

Small-scale LNG/Coal Seam Gas Synergies in New Zealand

2010/06/22

New Zealand-based L&M Energy (LME) intends to explore small-scale liquefied natural gas (SSLNG) projects with one of New Zealand’s largest trucking companies - HW Richardson Group Limited (HWRG), according to a June 9 Gas Today (Australia) report. ... Read more

Waste to Energy

Next-Generation Biofuels: USDA Issues a Report

2010/06/22

On May 14 the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released a report entitled Next-Generation Biofuels: Near-Term Challenges and Implications for Agriculture projecting that U.S. biofuel capacity should reach about 88 million gallons in 2010, due primarily to Dynamic Fuels’ noncellulosic animal fat-to-green diesel facility’s expected launch in 2010. ... Read more