“The Kemper Project” Clean Coal Plant Is a Flailing

Many people interested in technology and green projects will have heard of the Kemper project of Mississippi.  It is the first of its kind regarding a coal plant that uses the gasification and carbon capture at this level and began construction in 2010 with hopes to be finished later this year.  But, it has recently been under the limelight, and not in a good way.

Various investigations have been made into the Kemper project recently for a few reasons. The first reason is that originally, the project was due to be completed in 2014, but has fallen behind by almost two years.  Also, the original budget was set at $2.4 billion, but costs have so far risen to over $6 billion, and the Mississippi taxpayers are now expected to pay for this over spending.

The Kemper project seems to have been one big disaster from the start.  With the actual building taking place when the design of it was not even a third completed, alarm bells should have begun ringing then.  Although the idea may have sounded good on paper, putting into fruition seems to have more trouble than is worth.  Whether the problems the project faced were purely down to poor management is yet to be determined.

There are many other projects out there, worldwide, that use carbon capture and storage (CCS), where the CO2 from the emissions is captured and stored underground, with two being coal plants and most using different techniques. Biomass plants could be used as an alternative to coal plants, which would be far better than the environment.  But, any of these others would still be costly, as storing CO2 underground safely, is not cheap.

However, Iceland has recently designed a technique that mixes the CO2 with water and injects it into basaltic formations where it then turns to stone.  The whole process takes two years and would use far less energy for capturing the CO2 than the Kemper project. So, there are other alternatives to this type of carbon capture.  Is it time for us to cut our losses with this project and try and make the most out of what we have or do we let it continue with the risk of costing Mississippi residents millions more in taxes?
Story Via; NY Times

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