FUEL TECHNOLOGY

Silverado Green Fuel Inc., is working on the development of an environmentally friendly oil substitute produced from low-rank coal (LRC). Silverado’s Low-Rank Coal-Water Fuel (LRCWF) or Green Fuel is not a new fuel, but a new fuel form. Green Fuel is a stable liquid fuel which provides a non-hazardous, low cost alternative to petroleum derived fuels that can use existing oil infrastructure for handling, storage and transportation.

To produce Silverado’s Green Fuel, low-rank coal is pulverized and then hydrothermally treated at moderate temperatures and pressures. Water that is removed from the coal during the hydrothermal treatment (HT) process is reused in formulating Green Fuel. Low rank coals, such as subbituminous, lignitic, and brown coals, are characterized by high moisture levels and a low carbon to hydrogen ratio, which gives superior combustion characteristics. Burning Silverado’s Green Fuel simply involves burning a beneficiated form of low rank coal. Green Fuel has a higher energy content than the original coal while retaining all the desirable low-rank coal combustion characteristics needed for use in oil-designed boilers and advanced combustion and gasification systems.

This process eliminates all of the utilization and environmental problems associated with bulk coal handling and use. The wide spread use and distribution of Silverado’s Green Fuel would also eliminate the hazards associated with devastating oil spills and related environmental catastrophes.

DEMONSTRATION PROJECT

The technical feasibility of producing and utilizing Silverado’s Green Fuel has been demonstrated on a pilot plant scale. Green Fuel made from ultra-low sulfur Alaskan subbituminous coal performed well in combustion tests giving nearly complete carbon burnout, minimal fouling, and yielded SO emissions below the most stringent environmental requirements. Process economics suggest that Silverado’s Green Fuel can be made from the vast low-rank coal deposits in the Gulf States, the Great Plains, the Powder River Basin, and Alaska for under $15 per barrel on an oil equivalent energy basis (BOE).

The last step required to commercialize this promising technology is to complete Silverado’s LRCWF Production and Boiler Testing Demonstration Program. The Green Fuel production facility would provide about 110,000 barrels of Silverado’s Green Fuel per year for tests in end-users' operations to verify scale-up engineering design parameters, provide viable process economics, and determine operating efficiency in oil-designed boilers and advanced power systems. The facility would also serve as a personnel training and development center to instruct engineers and operators in the production and utilization of Green Fuel and will incorporate laboratory facilities for new fuels design and testing. It is also likely to serve as a host site, which could contain test facilities for engine, turbine, and other advanced combustor development. It will provide a unique site where industry and researchers can develop advanced clean coal utilization technologies based on Green Fuel.

Silverado's Green Fuel Demonstration Project will show the economic feasibility and environmental superiority of converting LRCs into stable liquid fuels that can be used efficiently in oil-fired boilers, in Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle Power facilities and in other advanced combustors operating at high temperatures and pressures. It will also, in conjunction with independent process developers’ facilities, produce clean fuels for required DoD engine tests.

COMMERCIAL PRODUCTION

During the Demonstration Project, Silverado will begin developing the financing, design and will initiate the permitting of a commercial facility to produce a minimum of 4,000,000 Barrel of Oil Equivalents (BOEs) of Green Fuel per year. We estimate that the capital costs for a plant this size in Alaska would be around $150 MM and have an annual operating cost of about $12.5 MM. Capital and operating cost are projected to be lower for plants located in the Lower 48. Upside capacity will be a function of available LRC and capital, which we project will be plentiful.

ECOPLEX – DOWNSTREAM PRODUCTS PRODUCTION FACILITY

The lowest cost route to ultra clean fuels and petrochemicals from coal is to first gasify coal with steam and oxygen or air into synthesis gas (CO and H2) and then catalytically reform the synthesis gas into a wide spectrum of fuels and petrochemicals. Arguably the most environmentally benign gasification process is based on high pressure slurry fed gasifiers developed by Texaco. Texaco gasifiers were coupled with General Electric’s gas-fired turbines to generate power at EPRI’s “Cool Water” facility, the world’s first ultra clean integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plant. It is also the basis for Tampa Electric’s 250 MWe installation built with funding from DOE’s Clean Coal Technology Program. GE Energy recently acquired the Texaco gasification technology and now offers a complete package for cleanly turning coal into power and/or ultra clean fuels and petrochemicals.

Due to their high inherent moisture levels, low-rank coals (LRCs) were not considered good feedstocks for Texaco gasification. High-rank bituminous coals and petroleum coke were preferred feedstocks to make concentrated slurries for feed to Texaco gasifiers. However, the development of Silverado’s hydrothermal treatment process enables LRCs to be formulated into Green Fuel with solids content approaching those in commercial bituminous CWFs. Thus, hydrothermal treatment will make it possible to extend Texaco gasification and the subsequent conversion of synthesis gas into fuels and petrochemicals to all ranks of coal.

SILVERADO’S GREEN FUEL IS AMERICA’S BEST CHOICE FOR LOW COST,
POLLUTION FREE ENERGY USING COAL

Since low cost power from coal appears to be the most logical energy alternative for the foreseeable future, we must continue to develop ways to use coal in a more environmentally acceptable manner while maintaining realistic competitive economics. This is the driving force for President Bush’s Energy Policy Plan, the National Energy Technology Center Vision 21 Program, and the United States Department of Energy Clean Coal Power Initiative. Coal is Americas’ only fossil energy resource abundant enough to be considered a strategic fuel, but to qualify as such, some of it must be available in a liquid form i.e., Silverado’s Green Fuel.

There are hundreds of commercial, industrial and utility oil-designed boilers in use in America today which, with minor adaptations can be fired with Silverado’s low cost, environmentally friendly Green Fuel, made from America’s abundant reserves of low–rank coal. The low cost of Green Fuel will undoubtedly provide life extensions for many of these facilities. However, as the older facilities are retired some of them will be replaced with integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) plants. If these IGCC plants are powered by Texaco gasification technology LRCWF will enable low cost LRCs to be used as the feedstock.

The most environmentally sound method to generate power from coal is via IGCC. In this process coal is gasified at high temperatures and pressures. The synthesis gas is shifted entirely to CO2 and H2. CO2 is then scrubbed out and recovered for sale for enhanced oil recovery or sequestering in deep alkaline aquifers. Pure H2 could then be converted to electricity in a gas turbine or fuel cell with no additional CO production. Silverado’s Green Fuel is an excellent feedstock for power generation via slurry-fed gasifiers in consideration of the environment and maintenance of favorable economics.

Silverado has been working with federal, state and local governments as well as private entities in securing the necessary funding to move forward with the Green Fuel production and utilization demonstration project.

Most recently, Silverado has focused its efforts in Mississippi, which has enthusiastically embraced this project at all levels of their state and local governments. Silverado has signed a memorandum of understanding with Choctaw County and Mississippi Development Authority officials. The signing and upcoming groundbreaking ceremony will pave the way for the 18 – 24 month construction program which, on completion, will begin production of Silverado’s Green Fuel.

Silverado Green Fuel is proud to be on the leading edge of Clean Coal Technology development aimed at producing a low-cost, non-hazardous oil substitute from America’s abundant reserves of low-rank coal. Silverado’s Green Fuel can become America’s strategic fuel and begin reducing our dependence on imported oil in an environmentally friendly manner.