Question

Describe three clean coal technologies and how they can mitigate the environmental impacts of coal. Explain how they work and provide a source that provides evidence of the use of clean coal technology today.

Answer 1

Clean coal technology refers to a gathering of technologies being created in order to reduce the environmental influence of coal energy production and to mitigate global climate change. There are three distinct technological procedures accessible for the aim of capturing carbon as demanded by the clean coal concept:  

1. Pre-combustion capture: This includes gasification of a feedstock like coal to generate gas that may be shifted to develop a mixture of carbon dioxide and hydrogen gas, from which the carbon dioxide can be effectively separated and captured, transported, and eventually sequestered.  

2. Post-combustion capture: This is the capturing of carbon dioxide from the exhaust gases of combustion methods.  

3. Oxy-fuel combustion: The fossil fuels like coal are combusted in a mixture of oxygen and recirculated flue gas, rather than in air that hugely withdraws nitrogen from the flue gas allowing capturing of low-cost and efficient carbon dioxide.  

An initial example of a coal-based plant utilizing carbon capturing technology is a Swedish company Vattenfall's Schwarze Pumpe power station situated in Germany.