Mass. plant will make natural gas from coal
boston.com
By Robert Gavin, Globe Staff | October 25, 2007
A Cambridge start-up that converts coal to clean-burning natural gas will take its cutting-edge process to the next step, building a $25 million demonstration plant near Fall River to ready their technology for full-scale commercial production.
GreatPoint Energy Inc., is scheduled today to unveil its plan to develop the project, which includes a research center, at the Brayton Point power station in Somerset, a coal-burning plant owned by Dominion, a Richmond, Va., utility and energy company. GreatPoint will create more than 100 jobs at its new facility after completion in about a year.
"This is where we are going to demonstrate our technology to the world," said Andrew Perlman, GreatPoint's chief executive. "This is going to be the most leading-edge gasification center anywhere."
The development of the demonstration plant and research center represents a milestone not only for the company, but also the state and its burgeoning alternative energy sector. GreatPoint is considered among the nation's most promising alternative energy firms, and recently raised $100 million from investors, one of the industry's biggest venture capital rounds ever.
For Massachusetts, GreatPoint's selection of Brayton Point over sites in three other states further solidifies its position as a leading center of alternative energy technology, an emerging sector that employs an estimated 14,000 in the state. It also indicates the sector is maturing, moving closer to commercial production that could mean even more growth for the sector and state employment.
"This isn't a few hippies in the backwoods," said Warren Leon, director of the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust, which finances alternative energy projects. "GreatPoint is showing that creative new technologies are starting to hit the big time."
The demonstration plant will produce natural gas on a small scale as a way to test and refine the process for full-scale commercial production. Once the technology proves ready for commercial production, Massachusetts could reap another benefit too: lower energy costs. Massachusetts companies and residents pay among the highest natural gas rates in the country. Perlman said his firm's process can produce natural gas for about half the cost it now sells for.
"One of our major economic challenges is the high cost of natural gas," said state Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs Ian Bowles, "and this is potentially a game-changing technology."
GreatPoint uses a proprietary catalyst to convert coal, petroleum coke, a refining byproduct, and organic material, such as switch grass, into methane, a clean-burning natural gas that can be transported through existing pipelines and burned in existing equipment. The process prevents the release of carbon dioxide, a so-called greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming, and captures other byproducts, such as sulfur, which can be reused by chemical makers.
The combination of environmental benefits and the ability to use the gas with existing equipment has attracted venture firms as well as traditional energy companies, such as AES Corp. of Arlington, Va., and Suncor Energy, Inc. of Calgary, Alberta, as investors. Coal is among the most plentiful, but also dirtiest energy sources, and solving the pollution problem is "one of the Holy Grails of the clean energy movements," said Jim Matheson, general partner at Flagship Ventures, a Cambridge venture capital firm that invests in alternative energy companies.
Flagship hasn't invested in GreatPoint.
"If you figure out a way to use coal cleanly, it's a huge opportunity," Matheson said. "Maybe they'll solve it, maybe they won't, but they're going after it in a very deliberate way."
GreatPoint was founded in 2005, and now employs about 45 in Cambridge and at a small pilot program near Chicago. The Chicago-area workforce will be consolidated into the new facility.
Perlman said the firm selected Massachusetts because of its access to engineering and technical talent at MIT and other universities, and the efforts of Governor Deval Patrick. During a meeting on energy this year, Patrick brought GreatPoint together with Dominion, one of the nation's biggest power generators. Dominion, which has a small investment in GreatPoint, is providing the site and technical support for the project, said Diane Leopold, a Dominion vice president.
"We don't believe coal is going to go away," said Leopold, "and we want to find a way to use coal that's extremely clean."
Robert Gavin can be reached at rgavin@globe.com.
© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.
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Energy research collaboration to add 100 jobs at Somerset plant
southcoasttoday.com
By BECKY W. EVANS
Standard-Times staff writer
October 25, 2007 6:00 AM
Dominion's Brayton Point power plant is collaborating with a Cambridge-based company to develop a new technology that converts coal and biomass products into natural gas.
GreatPoint Energy plans to build a research and development center and test facility on 4.5 acres at the Somerset plant, Gov. Deval Patrick announced Wednesday. The project is expected to create 100 new jobs for engineers and Ph.D.-level researchers.
"I am delighted that GreatPoint and Dominion are working together to advance a breakthrough energy technology," Gov. Patrick said in a statement. "It is this combination of know-how, entrepreneurship and experience that will help lead to a clean energy future for the commonwealth and the world."
Natural gas is considered cleaner than coal and other fossil fuels since it emits less of the major global warming gas carbon dioxide when burned to create electricity.
"The whole purpose of this R&D complex is to turn the dirtiest fuels into the cleanest fuels you can possibly find," said GreatPoint CEO Andrew Perlman.
He explained that the technology allows for the capture of carbon dioxide and other pollutants released when carbon is converted into natural gas.
"Everything that we generate we sell as a product," he said.
For example, carbon dioxide captured in the process could be sold to coal mines and pumped underground where it would not contribute to global warming, he said. The placement of carbon dioxide into a repository so that it cannot be released into the atmosphere is known as carbon sequestration.
The Somerset facility will test the gasification technology on coal and biomass products, such as wood chips, corn stalks, switch grass and other renewable energy sources found in New England, Mr. Perlman said.
GreatPoint hopes to build production plants near coal mines in the West, where carbon could be sequestered, he said. Plants on the East Coast would be more likely to gassify biomass since carbon sequestering "is not an option," he said. Either process would produce a low-cost natural gas that could be transported around the country through existing pipelines, he said.
"The potential for a new technology that can create natural gas that is divorced from the international market for gas is really exciting," said Ian Bowles, state Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs.
Mr. Bowles says he helped Dominion and GreatPoint collaborate on the project after representatives from the two companies met in January during a meeting organized by Gov. Patrick to address global warming and the state's clean energy future.
Dominion is excited about the project given its potential for environmental benefits and increased energy independence, said Diane Leopold, the company's vice president of fossil-hydro merchant operations.
The company is not committed to burn GreatPoint's natural gas product if the technology proves successful, but it will consider doing so, she said.
"We are very excited and certainly would consider using it in Dominion power plants in the future."
Brayton Point power plant burns mostly coal and oil to produce electricity, Dominion spokesman Dan Genest said. The plant currently burns an average of less than 0.5 percent natural gas, he said.
David Dionne of the Campaign to Clean Up Brayton Point said he was suspicious of the project and its support from the Patrick administration. The citizens' group has fought to restrict harmful emissions from the Brayton Point plant, which is the largest fossil fuel-fired plant in New England.
Coal gasification will neither eliminate carbon dioxide emissions nor solve global warming, said Mr. Dionne, who lives in Westport.
"I think the governor should put his efforts into helping Cape Wind be built," he said of the controversial Nantucket Sound wind farm. "Why should we go through all of these contortions to use coal when in fact something like Cape Wind can be built by a private contractor?"
Once the wind farm is built, it will produce no carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, mercury or other pollutants emitted by power plants, he said.
State legislators, meanwhile, have voiced support for the project.
"The SouthCoast is honored to have GreatPoint as a new member of our community," said state Sen. Joan Menard, D-Fall River. "We're looking forward to working with GreatPoint and Dominion on finding new and cleaner ways to produce energy for our region."
"This is a great opportunity for all of us," said state Rep. Patricia A. Haddad, D-Somerset. "We have been working for some time to make this happen in Somerset and I am pleased to see our efforts come to fruition."
Contact Becky W. Evans at revans@s-t.com |
