Peter McCusker Energy & Climate

CAN the American shale gas revolution be replicated in the UK, Peter McCusker reports.  LOWER natural gas prices are having a profound effect on American industry with many of the world’s chemical majors looking to build new US facilities after decades of investing elsewhere, particularly in the Middle East. The glut of shale gas has seen America become almost self-sufficient and this, combined with a lack of export facilities, has seen the price plummet. In Europe and the UK gas is trading at around $12 per mcf (thousand cubic feet), in Asia it’s over $14 per mcf whilst in the United States it is $3 per mcf  Consequently, over a dozen chemical majors are looking to invest in new US plant and take advantage of the substantially lower feedstock costs. Even Saudi Arabian-based SABIC (Saudi Basic Industries Corp), the world’s largest petrochemical company, is in talks about possible new US plant. In the UK there is much speculation about the extent of the UK’s s...

The North East of England is to become the first UK region capable of using all its domestic waste to generate electricity. Follow this link to the Newcastle Journal newspaper. http://www.nebusiness.co.uk/business-news/2020-vision/2013/02/13/building-blocks-of-biomass-energy-51140-32795870/2/ And to the next blog: "Garbage In - Power Out"

WORK has started on the construction of the world’s largest plasma gasification plant with its development signalling the dawning of a new era in the UK’s Energy from Waste sector. The £300m plant in Teesside, North East England, is being built by US industrial gases outfit Air Products using the latest plasma gasification technology developed by AlterNRG Westinghouse. The 50MW, Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant will convert domestic and commercial waste into a syngas, which can generate steam for electricity, or for producing chemicals or liquid fuels. The current technology deployed by the UK’s limited number of EfW plants is mass burn incineration which turns the waste into steam to power turbines. Emissions from these plants have led to concerns over the environment and health. Air Products has subsequently unveiled plans for a second plasma gasification EfW plant, next to the first one, and the two plants between them have the potential to recycle the rubbish from ...

THE UK Government’s drive to green the nation’s energy profile as outlined in the recent Energy Bill will not be achieved through supply side changes only. The shift from carbon-based energy will need to be accompanied by a renewed emphasis on reducing domestic and commercial energy demand, it says. In tandem with last month’s Energy Bill the Government launched its Energy Efficiency Strategy which informs that energy consumption will have to fall by up to 50% per head of the population to hit 2050 greenhouse gas emission reduction targets. A 127-page report released at the same time, from consultants Rand Europe, highlights global initiatives aimed at cutting energy use. One example saw a community of around 300 households in San Marcos, California compile their own energy-use league table which led to the high-energy users reducing consumption. Rand highlight measures which adopt “intervention” strategies which target “high energy-use households” and “team-based app...

FOLLOWING a 100 year gestation period there are signs we could be about to witness the birth of a new coal rush. The first Underground Coal Gasification (UCG) trials - during which coal’s inherent energy is extracted in situ - were conducted in the North East of England in 1912. One hundred years later scientists and businesspeople based in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, just a few miles from the site of the original trials, have launched a new drive to fully commercialise the potential of the earth’s remaining 850 billion tonnes of coal. They are amongst a host of global teams now working on commercial-scale UCG schemes, using directional drilling techniques from oil and gas exploration, which have added new momentum to the industry. In Australia Linc Energy’s UCG demonstration facility in Chinchilla, Queensland, Australia is operating successfully. And last month it signed a multi-million dollar deal with Chinese company GCL Projects Limited, a subsidiary of Golden Concord Group Limit...