[House Hearing, 108 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
WHAT ARE THE
ADMINISTRATION PRIORITIES FOR
CLIMATE CHANGE TECHNOLOGY?
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
NOVEMBER 6, 2003
__________
Serial No. 108-35
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/science
______
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COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE
HON. SHERWOOD L. BOEHLERT, New York, Chairman
LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas RALPH M. HALL, Texas
CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania BART GORDON, Tennessee
DANA ROHRABACHER, California JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois
JOE BARTON, Texas EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
KEN CALVERT, California LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California
NICK SMITH, Michigan NICK LAMPSON, Texas
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut
VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan MARK UDALL, Colorado
GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota DAVID WU, Oregon
GEORGE R. NETHERCUTT, JR., MICHAEL M. HONDA, California
Washington CHRIS BELL, Texas
FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma BRAD MILLER, North Carolina
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois LINCOLN DAVIS, Tennessee
WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri ZOE LOFGREN, California
TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois BRAD SHERMAN, California
MELISSA A. HART, Pennsylvania BRIAN BAIRD, Washington
JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma DENNIS MOORE, Kansas
J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York
PHIL GINGREY, Georgia JIM MATHESON, Utah
ROB BISHOP, Utah DENNIS A. CARDOZA, California
MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas VACANCY
JO BONNER, Alabama
TOM FEENEY, Florida
RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas
------
Subcommittee on Energy
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois, Chair
CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania NICK LAMPSON, Texas
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois
VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California
GEORGE R. NETHERCUTT, JR., DAVID WU, Oregon
Washington MICHAEL M. HONDA, California
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri BRAD MILLER, North Carolina
MELISSA A. HART, Pennsylvania LINCOLN DAVIS, Tennessee
PHIL GINGREY, Georgia RALPH M. HALL, Texas
JO BONNER, Alabama
SHERWOOD L. BOEHLERT, New York
KEVIN CARROLL Subcommittee Staff Director
TINA M. KAARSBERG Republican Professional Staff Member
CHARLES COOKE Democratic Professional Staff Member
JENNIFER BARKER Staff Assistant
KATHRYN CLAY Chairwoman's Designee
C O N T E N T S
November 6, 2003
Page
Witness List..................................................... 2
Hearing Charter.................................................. 3
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Judy Biggert, Chairman, Subcommittee
on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives. 8
Written Statement............................................ 9
Statement by Representative Nick Lampson, Minority Ranking
Member, Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S.
House of Representatives....................................... 10
Written Statement............................................ 11
Witnesses:
Mr. David Conover, Director, Climate Change Technology Program,
U.S. Department of Energy
Oral Statement............................................... 11
Written Statement............................................ 13
Biography.................................................... 16
Mr. George Rudins, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coal and Power
Systems, U.S. Department of Energy
Oral Statement............................................... 17
Written Statement............................................ 18
Biography.................................................... 22
Dr. Sally M. Benson, Deputy Director for Operations, Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory
Oral Statement............................................... 23
Written Statement............................................ 25
Biography.................................................... 27
Financial Disclosure......................................... 28
Dr. Marilyn A. Brown, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
Program, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Oral Statement............................................... 29
Written Statement............................................ 31
Biography.................................................... 36
Discussion....................................................... 36
Appendix 1: Additional Material for the Record
Letter to Robert Card from Chairman Boehlert and Chairman
Biggert, dated October 17, 2003................................ 56
Letter to Chairman Boehlert from Robert Card, dated November 6,
2003........................................................... 58
Report on Responses to the Request for Information Regarding the
National Climate Change Technology Initiative, U.S. Department
of Energy...................................................... 60
WHAT ARE THE ADMINISTRATION PRIORITIES FOR CLIMATE CHANGE TECHNOLOGY?
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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2003
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Energy,
Committee on Science,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:10 a.m., in
Room 2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Judy
Biggert [Chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
hearing charter
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
What Are the
Administration Priorities for
Climate Change Technology?
thursday, november 6, 2003
10:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m.
2318 rayburn house office building
Purpose
On Thursday, November 6, 2003 at 10:00 a.m., the Energy
Subcommittee of the House Science Committee will hold a hearing to
examine the Administration's progress on its climate change technology
programs.
The Administration is significantly behind its own schedule for
developing a climate technology research and development (R&D) plan.
Meanwhile, the Administration is emphasizing one particular R&D project
related to carbon sequestration, which raises several fundamental
policy and budget questions. (See below.)
Witnesses
The following witnesses will testify at the hearing:
Mr. David Conover is the Director of the interagency Climate Change
Technology Program (CCTP) housed at the Department of Energy (DOE).
Previously, he was Republican Staff Director & Chief Counsel of the
Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Mr. Conover holds a J.D.
from the Georgetown University Law Center.
Mr. George Rudins is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coal and Power
Systems at the U.S. Department of Energy.
Dr. Sally Benson is Deputy Director for Operations at Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory (LBNL) and director of the Geological-Sequestration
(GEO-SEQ) Project supported by the Office of Fossil Energy. She was the
Division Director for Earth Sciences at LBNL from 1993 to 2001. She is
a coordinating lead author on the geologic storage chapter of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) study related to
CO2 Capture and Storage.
Dr. Marilyn Brown is the Director of Energy Efficiency and Renewable
Energy at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). Dr. Brown recently
co-led ``Scenarios for a Clean Energy Future,'' a planning exercise
that examined the potential role of hundreds of technologies in
reducing carbon dioxide emissions over the next two decades. Dr. Brown
serves on the Board of Directors of the Alliance to Save Energy and the
National Commission on Energy Policy.
Overarching Questions
The hearing will address the following overarching questions:
1. What milestones has the Administration set for its climate
change technology programs? How are the Administration's goals
for its climate change technology development programs linked
to its goal of achieving atmospheric stabilization of
greenhouse gases, or to achieving its greenhouse gas intensity
goal?
2. How does the Administration determine which energy
technologies qualify as climate change technologies? How does
the Administration set R&D investment priorities among these
technologies? What weight should be given to non-climate
benefits such as improved economic efficiency, reduced
emissions of criteria pollutants, and enhanced energy security?
3. Why has the Department decided to place so much emphasis on
geological sequestration of carbon, a technology that is less
likely than other technologies to have benefits unrelated to
climate change?
Overview
On June 11, 2001, President Bush announced the
creation of two initiatives to address climate change: the
Climate Change Research Initiative (CCRI) to address areas of
scientific uncertainty, and the National Climate Change
Technology Initiative (NCCTI) to support applied research and
demonstration projects.\1\ At the working level, the CCRI was
to be headed by the Department of Commerce, and the NCCTI was
to be headed by the Department of Energy. The CCRI has since
been renamed the Climate Change Science Program (CCSP), and
NCCTI has since been renamed the Climate Change Technology
Program (CCTP).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ ``President Bush Discusses Global Climate Change,'' http://
www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/06/20010611-2.html.
The science initiative has made significant progress
over the last two years. The CCRI released an interagency
inventory of science activities in July 2002, and a draft
strategic plan in the fall of 2002. After extensive public
comment, it released its final strategic plan and program plan
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
in July 2003.
In contrast, the Climate Change Technology Program
has not yet released a review of existing climate-related
programs or a strategic plan for technology programs. In
discussions with Science Committee, DOE Under Secretary Robert
Card indicated that a draft plan for the CCTP would be released
by July 2002. Under Secretary Card testified to the Committee
in February 2003 that a review of climate change technology
programs would be complete by the summer of 2003, but that
deadline has passed as well.
The Administration's criteria for selecting and
prioritizing climate change technology projects have not been
released for public comment.
In February 2003, the Department announced a new ten-
year, $1 billion project, FutureGen, which is to build a
prototype plant that would combine the production of hydrogen
and electricity from coal with geologic sequestration of
carbon.
On September 30, 2003, the White House Council on
Environmental Quality (CEQ) released a fact sheet outlining the
Administration's climate change initiatives. The fact sheet
featured three major initiatives: the Hydrogen Initiative (the
DOE program designed to develop hydrogen-based fuels and cars);
the international fusion experimental reactor known as ITER;
and FutureGen. All three of these initiatives involve
technologies that are not expected to be available for
widespread use for at least 10 or 20 years.
Current Issues
What criteria are being used by the Administration to determine which
climate technology projects to undertake and are those the right
criteria?
Most experts recommend that a climate technology R&D portfolio be
balanced between shorter- and longer-term projects and among different
types of technologies, and that it be able to accommodate a variety of
energy price and regulatory scenarios. The projects that the
Administration labels as climate change technology are all longer-term,
but DOE does fund a wide variety of other R&D (e.g., energy efficiency)
that could have an impact on greenhouse gas emissions.
How do the CCTP and other climate technology programs relate to the
Administration's stated greenhouse gas emissions goals?
On February 14, 2002, President Bush announced the Administration's
goal of reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emission intensity (the amount of
emissions per unit of production) by 18 percent by the year 2012.
According to Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates, U.S.
emissions intensity will decrease by 14 percent by the year 2012 in the
absence of further action. Thus, the Administration goal requires a
reduction in emissions intensity of four percent over ten years
compared to the baseline case.
In the same speech, the President stated that the goal of U.S.
climate policy was to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the
atmosphere, but did not say at what concentration level or by what
date.
The Administration has given conflicting information about whether
the objectives of its climate change technology initiatives will be
linked to its broader climate goals. The Administration has also not
identified the milestones it will use to evaluate the progress made
under its climate change technology programs.
What were the criteria used to select carbon sequestration as a major
climate change technology initiative?
Carbon sequestration technologies refer to mechanisms designed to
capture carbon emissions and store the carbon to prevent it from
entering the atmosphere. Possible carbon sequestration methods include
piping carbon dioxide deep into the ocean or underground into geologic
formations. The latter approach is referred to as ``geologic
sequestration.''
Carbon sequestration is significantly less mature than many other
technologies that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as
renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies, and there are
fundamental questions that still require research on such matters as
the safety and long-term stability of geologic sequestration.
Moreover, carbon sequestration is harder to characterize as part of
a ``no regrets'' strategy--that is a climate change strategy that
provides benefits to the environment and the economy regardless of
whether human-induced climate change turns out to be a significant
problem. For example, renewable energy and energy efficiency
technologies can reduce emissions of pollutants and dependence on
foreign oil, as well as reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Background
What is the Department of Energy spending on climate change
technologies?
It depends on what is considered a climate change technology--a
question made more difficult by the lack of any plan for the CCTP. The
Department of Energy spent $2.7 billion in fiscal year (FY) 2002 on
applied energy research, development, and deployment programs. In a
report to Congress, the Office of Management and Budget estimated that
in FY 2002 the government spent more than $3.7 billion on climate
change technologies, with $1.6 billion (43 percent of the total) spent
at the Department of Energy.\2\
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\2\ Fiscal Year 2004 Report to Congress on Federal Climate Change
Expenditures, Office of Management and Budget.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is FutureGen?
In February 2003, Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham announced the
FutureGen initiative, a $1 billion, ten-year government-industry
partnership. The goal of the initiative is to build a prototype coal-
fired power plant that would combine electricity and hydrogen
production with geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide
(CO2).
The FutureGen project would combine an Integrated Gasification
Combined Cycle (IGCC) mid-sized coal plant (275 megawatts) with
processes to separate, capture, and permanently store the CO2
emitted by the plant. Separating out the carbon would leave a stream of
hydrogen-rich gas that could then be combusted in a turbine, used in a
fuel cell, or fed into a refinery to upgrade petroleum products. Once
captured, the CO2 would be injected deep underground into a
geologic reservoir.
Experts in geologic sequestration emphasize that the selection of
an appropriate site will be critical to the success of the FutureGen
project. For a site to be considered appropriate it would have to
provide a high degree of confidence that the CO2 would be
permanently isolated from the atmosphere. An exceedingly small (less
than 0.1 percent per year) leak rate for the stored CO2
would likely be needed to ensure the intended climate mitigation
benefits. Other important siting considerations include public safety
and the ability to build comparable plants elsewhere using similar
geologic formations.
One concern with the FutureGen project is that it focuses on
building an actual plant while much basic research may still need to be
done to answer fundamental questions about the nature and feasibility
of geologic sequestration.
What technological developments will geologic sequestration of CO2
require?
The technology to inject CO2 into geologic formations,
developed for enhanced oil recovery is mature and directly applicable
to carbon sequestration. However, far less is known about whether
CO2 can be stored successfully for long periods of time
underground in petroleum-bearing rock formations. Moreover, still less
is known about how to store CO2 in other, more common types
of geologic formations, such as saline aquifers (underground rock
formations containing salt water).
Only one large-scale demonstration of carbon sequestration in a
saline aquifer has been done worldwide. This project, owned and
operated by Statoil, Norway's state oil company, has injected about a
million tons of CO2 into the Sleipner aquifer below the
North Sea since 1996. The Sleipner aquifer is an uncommon formation,
and it is unclear if the lessons learned on that project will be widely
applicable.
Three types of reservoirs are candidates for geologic
sequestration: depleted oil and gas fields, unmineable coal beds, and
saline aquifers. Characterizing these reservoirs--their geologic
stability, their capacity to absorb CO2, and their rates of
CO2 leakage--will be one of the primary technical challenges
to geologic sequestration.
Depleted oil and gas fields are known to be geologically stable to
a high degree of certainty. Carbon storage in these fields builds on
extensive experience with enhanced oil recovery using CO2.
But depleted oil and gas fields are relatively few in number, and at
current rates of CO2 generation from energy use, all such
reservoirs would be filled in a matter of decades.
Injecting CO2 into unmineable coal seams could provide
carbon storage along with economic benefits through methane generation.
Carbon dioxide injected into the seam dislodges methane that is adhered
to the surface of the coal, leaving the methane free to flow out of the
seam. A pilot project of CO2-assisted coal bed methane
production has been underway in the San Juan Basin, New Mexico, since
1996.
Saline aquifers are plentiful throughout North America, and in
theory could provide enough storage for carbon generated over
centuries. Carbon dioxide injected into the aquifers either slowly
dissolves into the water within, or is converted to a mineral form over
decades. Technical questions remain about the long-term stability of
this type of carbon storage. Further work is needed to determine
leakages rate into drinking water and the atmosphere.
Another crucial area for further technical work is the development
of adequate, cost-effective monitoring systems. Monitoring of
subsurface CO2 flows will be essential to ensuring that the
CO2 contained in the reservoirs remains isolated from the
atmosphere. Monitoring is also important for achieving public
acceptance of geological sequestration. In large concentrations,
CO2 is an asphyxiant. Long-term carbon storage will require
sophisticated monitoring devices to detect escaping CO2
before dangerous concentrations accumulate.
How are hydrogen technologies related to climate change?
The FutureGen project will be designed to produce hydrogen, which
would help accomplish the Administration goal of moving toward a
``hydrogen economy.'' Hydrogen is not a greenhouse gas, and has no
known detrimental effects on the environment. Hydrogen can be produced
from many sources other than coal with far fewer environmental
concerns. Some experts believe that the Administration may be placing
too much emphasis on producing hydrogen from coal.
Questions for Witnesses
In the invitation to testify, the witnesses were asked to address
the following questions:
Mr. Dave Conover
1. When will the Administration release for public comment its
draft strategy for the Climate Change Technology Program
(CCTP)? What milestones has the Administration set for its
climate change technology programs?
2. What were the total federal expenditures on climate change
technologies in fiscal year 2003? Please include a breakdown of
these expenditures by agency, or by project. What are the
proposed expenditures for fiscal year 2004?
3. How are the Administration's goals for climate change
technology development linked to achieving its stated
greenhouse gas intensity goal, or to its stated goal of
achieving atmospheric stabilization of greenhouse gases? What
is the timeline for the latter goal?
4. How does the Administration determine which energy
technologies qualify as climate change technologies? How does
the Administration set R&D investment priorities among these
technologies? What weight should be given to non-climate
benefits such as improved economic efficiency, reduced
emissions of criteria pollutants, and enhanced energy security?
5. Why has the Department decided to place so much emphasis on
geological sequestration of carbon, a technology that is poorly
understood and is less likely than other technologies to have
benefits unrelated to climate change?
Mr. George Rudins
1. What are the most important outstanding technical issues
associated with geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide? What
technical questions will the FutureGen project be designed to
address? Is our state of knowledge sufficient to proceed with a
full-scale carbon sequestration demonstration project?
2. How did the Department choose the scale and scope of
FutureGen? How did the Department determine the cost of this
project? What levels of funding will be provided by industry
and international partners?
3. What factors will the Department consider in selecting
geological sites for carbon sequestration projects and
experiments? What work should be done prior to selection of the
FutureGen site?
Dr. Sally Benson
1. What are the most important outstanding technical issues
associated with geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide
(CO2)? Please describe the geologic, environmental,
economic, and technical uncertainties. What portion of these
uncertainties could be reduced through additional research?
2. Is our state of knowledge sufficient to proceed with a
full-scale carbon sequestration demonstration project? By
concentrating funding in one large project, do we run the risk
of moving to large-scale sequestration before the technical
uncertainties have been adequately addressed?
3. What factors should the Department consider in selecting
geological sites for carbon sequestration projects and
research? What work should be done prior to selection of the
FutureGen site?
4. What are the costs of CO2 injection? How
directly do the injection technologies developed for secondary
recovery of oil apply to the injection of CO2 for
sequestration?
Dr. Marilyn Brown
1. How would you define a well-balanced climate change
technology portfolio for the U.S.? Are there climate change
technologies that you feel the Administration should give
greater emphasis? What evidence do we have that R&D investments
in greenhouse gas mitigation technologies can deliver products
that industry, businesses, and consumers will choose to use?
2. If we counted the non-climate benefits of federal climate
change R&D investments, such as improved economic efficiency,
reduced emissions of criteria pollutants, and enhanced energy
security, would we be making the same investments we are now
making?
3. The ``no regrets'' strategy pursued in the George Herbert
Walker Bush Administration targeted cost-effective energy
efficiency measures as the first priority in funding projects
to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. What are our best
quantitative estimates of the benefits from a concerted
investment in cost-effective energy efficiency technologies?
Please include estimates of emissions reductions, improvements
in GHG intensity, and reductions in criteria pollutants, and
economic benefits.
Chairwoman Biggert. The hearing will come to order. I want
to welcome everyone here today to this hearing of the Energy
Subcommittee, the purpose of which is to review the
Administration's progress on its climate change technology
programs.
On June 11, 2001, President Bush announced the creation of
two initiatives to address climate change, the Climate Change
Research Initiative, CCRI, to address areas of scientific
uncertainty, and the National Climate Change Technology
Initiative, now known simply as the Climate Change Technology
Program, or CCTP, to support applied research and technology
demonstration project. The Administration has made significant
progress over the last two years with respect to the science
initiative releasing in July, 2002, an inventory of science
activities across agencies that will fill the gaps in our
understanding of climate change. After extensive public
comment, it released a final strategic plan and program in July
of 2003.
In contrast, the Climate Change Technology Program is still
at the study line. The Administration charged the Department of
Energy with leading the interaction CCTP effort back in July of
2001. Since then, we have asked the Department for a report on
its Climate Change Technology Initiative, and today, we did
receive the first down payment, or the first installment of the
report, and I hope that this will be addressed in somewhat in
the hearing today.
Since I have not had a chance to read it, it is hot off the
press, nor have the other Members, so--but I would ask
unanimous consent to include the report in the record at this
time. So ordered.
[The information referred to appears in the Appendix.]
Chairwoman Biggert. The pieces that we have already had
included, the President's Hydrogen Initiative, the subject of a
hearing by the Full Science Committee earlier this year and one
of the Administration's major actions relating to climate
change, according to the White House Council on Environmental
Quality. Another big piece that we are aware of is the
FutureGen, a new 10 year, $1 billion project to generate
hydrogen electricity from coal while sequestering the carbon
and geological formations. This will enable DOE to demonstrate
on a large scale that existing sequestration technologies and
perhaps those still under development work on the ground, or
perhaps I should say work in the ground and work well enough to
convince investors to put their money into what hopefully
becomes the next generation of coal power plants.
While we are talking about hydrogen, FutureGen, or
sequestration, these initiatives could pay off substantially in
the long-term, not only by reducing emissions, the greenhouse
gases, but also by improving America's energy independence. In
the short-term, there is much more R&D already underway at the
DOE and other federal agencies that could result in
technologies with immediate climate change benefits. Is this
R&D and our resulting technologies a part of the DOE's Climate
Change Technology Program? If so, how did the DOE decide which
technologies made the final cut for inclusion in the CCTP.
But the questions don't stop here. How will FutureGen and
carbon sequestration programs build off and complement DOE's
existing energy efficiency and renewable energy programs. How
will the technology milestones for these programs help us meet
the President's goals of reducing the carbon intensity of our
economy and stabilizing atmospheric concentration of greenhouse
gases?
I am asking these questions because I want the DOE to
succeed. I think my colleagues here today share the sentiment.
We want FutureGen, carbon sequestration and all of DOE's other
climate change technologies to work and to work well. I think
we can all agree that our investments in such technologies
serve as a kind of insurance policy against climate change,
supporting a diverse portfolio of climate change technologies
such as energy efficiency, carbon sequestration and carbon
neutral energy technologies, including even nuclear energy,
will provide us with the most insurance coverage for the best
price.
I want to thank the witnesses for sharing their expertise
with us today. I am confident that you can give us a first
installment of DOE's plan and the promise of climate changes
technologies like hydrogen, FutureGen and carbon sequestration.
So I look forward to our discussion. The Chair now recognizes
Mr. Lampson, the Ranking Minority Member on the Energy
Subcommittee, for his opening statement.
[The prepared statement of Chairman Biggert follows:]
Prepared Statement of Chairman Judy Biggert
The hearing will come to order.
I want to welcome everyone to this hearing of the Energy
Subcommittee, the purpose of which is to review the Administration's
progress on its climate change technology programs.
On June 11, 2001, President Bush announced the creation of two
initiatives to address climate change: the Climate Change Research
Initiative (CCRI) to address areas of scientific uncertainty, and the
National Climate Change Technology Initiative, now known simply as the
Climate Change Technology Program or CCTP, to support applied research
and technology demonstration projects.
The Administration has made significant progress over the last two
years with respect to the science initiative, releasing in July 2002 an
inventory of science activities across agencies that will fill the gaps
in our understanding of climate change. After extensive public comment,
it released a final strategic plan and program plan in July 2003.
In contrast, the Climate Change Technology Program is still at the
starting line. All we know is that the Administration charged the
Department of Energy with leading the interagency CCTP effort back in
July 2001. Since then, we have asked the Department on numerous
occasions for a report on its climate change technology initiative, and
it has promised to provide one. At this point, the DOE is significantly
behind its own schedule to provide that report. We hope today to hear
something about what that report will look like, and when we can expect
to see it.
Without this report, Congress is left to complete a puzzle for
which we don't have the full picture, or all the pieces. The pieces we
do have include the President's hydrogen initiative, the subject of a
hearing by the Full Science Committee earlier this year, and one of the
Administration's major actions relating to climate change according to
the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
Another big piece we are aware of is FutureGen, a new ten-year, $1
billion project to generate hydrogen and electricity from coal while
sequestering the carbon in geologic formations. This will enable DOE to
demonstrate on a large scale that existing sequestration technologies,
and those still under development, work ``on the ground''--or perhaps I
should say, work ``in the ground''--and work well enough to convince
investors to put their money into what hopefully becomes the next
generation of coal power plant.
Whether we are talking about hydrogen, FutureGen, or sequestration,
these initiatives could pay off substantially in the long-term, not
only by reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, but also by improving
America's energy independence.
In the short-term, there is much more R&D already underway at the
DOE and other federal agencies that could result in technologies with
immediate climate change benefits. Is this R&D, and are the resulting
technologies, a part of the DOE's climate change technology program? If
so, how did the DOE decide which technologies made the final cut for
inclusion in the CCTP?
But the questions don't stop there. How will FutureGen and carbon
sequestration programs build off and complement DOE's existing energy
efficiency and renewable energy programs? How will the technology
milestones for these programs help us meet the President's goals of
reducing the carbon intensity of our economy and stabilizing
atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases?
I am asking these tough questions because I want the DOE to
succeed. I think my colleagues here today share that sentiment. We want
FutureGen, carbon sequestration, and all of DOE's other climate change
technologies to work and work well.
I think we can all agree that our investments in such technologies
serve as a kind of insurance policy against climate change. Supporting
a diverse portfolio of climate change technologies such as energy
efficiency, carbon sequestration, and carbon-neutral energy
technologies--including even nuclear energy--will provide us with the
most insurance coverage for the best price.
I want to thank the witnesses for sharing their expertise with us
today. Despite the absence of a report or plan for the CCTP, I am
confident that you can give us at least a sneak preview of the DOE's
plan, and the promise of climate change technologies like hydrogen,
FutureGen, and carbon sequestration. I look forward to our discussion.
Mr. Lampson. And I thank you, Chairwoman Biggert, for the
time to speak this morning, and for your putting together this
hearing, and I look forward to hearing the comments of all of
our panelists.
I know that when President Bush announced the criterion for
two climate change initiatives in June of 2001, it was hoped
that the Administration was beginning to focus on the climate
change problem. And while the Science Initiative at the
Department of Commerce has made a significant amount of
progress since President Bush's speech, the Climate Change
Technology Program at the Department of Energy has yet to share
a view of--a review of existing programs, or a strategic plan
with this Committee, and I understand that, you know, we have
missed some deadlines and certainly this report this morning is
helpful and shows the good faith that we, indeed, want, are
most interested in, in as far as reaching the completion and
completing the review of climate change programs, and we also
do not yet know DOE's criteria for selecting and prioritizing
these projects.
In the meantime, the White House Council on Environmental
Quality recently outlined the Administration's major climate
change initiatives. These include the Hydrogen Fuels and Cars
Initiative, the ITER Fusion Project and FutureGen, the billion
dollar prototype plant that will combine the production of
hydrogen and electricity from coal with geological
sequestration of carbon, and I am hopeful that we can hear from
our witnesses today about the criteria that this Administration
is using to choose which climate technology projects should be
pursued.
I have concerns about pursuing research and development
projects that are not expected to be available for widespread
use for at least 10 or 20 years from now. We need to put more
emphasis on technologies and energy efficiency which could have
real benefits today. I am also anxious to learn what
technological benefits the geologic sequestration of carbon
will provide to help us in the climate change arena.
Again, I thank our witnesses for joining us, and I look
forward to learning more about the Administration's climate
change--climate technology research and development plans, and
I yield back my time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Lampson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Nick Lampson
Chairwoman Biggert, thank you for holding this hearing today on the
Administration's progress on its climate change technology programs. I
look forward to hearing from our outstanding panel of witnesses today.
When President Bush announced the creation of two climate change
initiatives in June of 2001, it was hoped that the Administration was
beginning to focus on the climate change problem.
While the science initiative at the Department of Commerce has made
a significant amount of progress since President Bush's speech--the
Climate Change Technology Program at the Department of Energy has yet
to share a review of existing programs or a strategic plan with this
committee.
It is my understanding that DOE has missed deadlines for releasing
a draft plan for the program and completing the review of climate
change programs.
We also do not yet know DOE's criteria for selecting and
prioritizing these projects.
In the meantime, the White House Council on Environmental Quality
recently outlined the Administration's major climate change
initiatives.
These include the Hydrogen fuels and cars initiative, the ITER
fusion project, and FutureGen, the $1 billion prototype plant that will
combine the production of hydrogen and electricity from coal with
geological sequestration of carbon.
I am hopeful that we can hear from our witnesses today about the
criteria that this Administration is using to choose which climate
technology projects should be pursued.
I have concerns about pursuing research and development projects
that are not expected to be available for widespread use for at least
10 to 20 years.
I am also anxious to learn what technological benefits the geologic
sequestration of carbon will provide to help us in the climate change
arena.
Again I thank our witnesses for joining us today and I look forward
to learning more about the Administration's climate technology research
and development plans.
Chairwoman Biggert. I would like to ask at this time for
unanimous consent that all Members who wish to do so have their
opening statements entered into the record. Without objection,
so ordered.
It is my pleasure to welcome our witnesses for today's
hearing and to introduce them to you. They are Mr. David
Conover, the Director of Interagency Climate Change Technology
Program, CCTP, at the Department of Energy, welcome. And then,
Mr. George Rudins, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coal and
Power Systems at the Department of Energy, welcome to you. Dr.
Sally Benson, Deputy Director for Operations at Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory; and Dr. Marilyn Brown, the
Director of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy at the Oak
Ridge National Laboratory, welcome to you both.
As the witnesses know, spoken testimony will be limited to
five minutes each, after which the Members will have five
minutes each to ask questions, so we will begin with Mr.
Conover.
STATEMENT OF DAVID CONOVER, DIRECTOR, CLIMATE CHANGE TECHNOLOGY
PROGRAM, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
Mr. Conover. Madam Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for this opportunity to testify today on the Bush
Administration's climate change technology priorities.
The Climate Change Technology Program, or CCTP, is a multi-
agency research, development and deployment coordination
activity, organized under the auspices of the Cabinet-level
Committee on Climate Change, Science and Technology
Integration. CCTP was established in 2002 to implement the
President's National Climate Change Technology Initiative. By
focusing federal RD&D programs on achieving the President's
climate change goals, both near and long-term, our multi-agency
organizational structure provides an opportunity across the
Federal Government, to develop a coherent plan for climate
change technology R&D.
Our draft plan should be available in the first calendar
quarter of 2004. As an initial part of the plan, we are
establishing an inventory of climate change technology
activities using a set of defined criteria. To be included in
the CCTP inventory, R&D activities must be aimed at one or more
of the following: current and future reductions in, or
avoidances of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; greenhouse gas
capture and/or long-term storage; conversion of greenhouse
gases to beneficial uses in ways that avoid emissions to the
atmosphere; monitoring and/or measurement of emissions,
inventories and fluxes in a variety of settings; technologies
that improve or displace other GHG-emitting technologies,
thereby reducing emissions compared to technologies they
displace; technologies that could enable or facilitate the
development, deployment and use of other greenhouse gas
emission reduction technologies; technologies that alter,
substitute for, or otherwise replace processes, materials and/
or feed stocks, resulting in lower net emission of greenhouse
gases; basic research activities undertaken explicitly to
address a technical barrier to progress on one of the above
climate change technologies; greenhouse gas emissions resulting
from clear improvements in management practices.
Using the inventory as a baseline, we will then apply
principles to guide our investments. These principles include
diversification, the logical sequencing of R&D investments,
systems integration and planning in the face of uncertainty.
Let me highlight three of those. Diversification is important
for several reasons. The potential magnitude of the
technological challenge posed by climate change makes it
extremely unlikely that a single technology could meet the
challenge on its own. A diversified portfolio is a hedge
against the possibility that some advanced technologies may not
be as successful as hoped, while others in the portfolio could
exceed expectations. A diversified portfolio maintains the
flexibility to respond to new information, and a diversified
portfolio is better able to balance short and long-term
objectives.
The principle of sequencing R&D investments to quickly
resolve critical uncertainties and to demonstrate early the
feasibility of determinate technologies is also very important
and helps explain our increased attention to carbon
sequestration research. If large-scale geological sequestration
is proved successful, then continued use of fossil fuels will
be possible and future climate change strategies could be built
on existing infrastructure, thus accelerating progress and
avoiding the early, costly retirement of that infrastructure.
If large-scale geologic sequestration were to prove
unsuccessful, the longer-term climate change technology
portfolio will need to place even more emphasis on energy
efficiency and zero emissions technologies such as renewable
energy and nuclear power.
The principle of recognizing uncertainty and planning for
the long-term requires a robust portfolio that can be
successful under a number of economic and energy policy
scenarios. While nearly all such scenarios rely heavily on
further advances in energy efficiency, we will also need
significant new sources of low carbon or zero carbon energy
supply. Thus, some investments focus on development of low
carbon fossil fuel technologies that employ sequestration.
Others focus on building a new energy backbone, envisioning
increased roles for renewable energy and advanced concepts for
nuclear power.
Some activities are long-term, more risky, but potentially
transforming technologies, such as fusion energy and advances
in biotechnology. We also want to ensure that innovative,
cross-cutting technology ideas with significant potential to
reduce, avoid, or sequester greenhouse gas emissions are not
overlooked.
Using these principles and the professional judgment of the
interagency participants, the CCTP will assess the inventory of
activities to clearly articulate priorities in the context of
the President's FY 2005 budget. These will likely be consistent
with the Administration's current priorities, such as the
Hydrogen Fuel Initiative, FutureGen and fusion, which are well-
aligned with our planning principles and are highlighted in my
written testimony.
Madam Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, these
current priorities and other climate change technology efforts
together constitute a diverse portfolio of energy technologies
that has the potential to bring about dramatic improvements in
our energy systems with significantly reduced greenhouse gas
emissions.
I look forward to working with the Members of this
Subcommittee as the Climate Change Technology Program moves
forward in evaluating, making recommendations and reporting
progress on our technology-based approaches to address the risk
of climate change.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I look
forward to answering your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Conover follows:]
Prepared Statement of David W. Conover
Madam Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee,
Thank you for this opportunity to testify today on the Bush
Administration's activities for climate change technology. My testimony
will cover the mission and activities of the Climate Change Technology
Program; criteria and principles for climate change technology
investments; and some highlights of our current climate change
technology activities.
Climate Change Technology Program
As part of the President's National Climate Change Technology
Initiative, launched on June 11, 2001, the President directed the
Secretary of Energy, in coordination with the Secretary of Commerce and
the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, to lead a
multi-agency review of the Federal R&D portfolio and make
recommendations. The Climate Change Technology Program (CCTP) was
established in 2002 to implement the President's Initiative. I am the
Program's Director.
The CCTP is a multi-agency research and development (R&D)
coordination activity, organized under the auspices of the Cabinet-
level Committee on Climate Change Science and Technology Integration
(CCCSTI). Participating federal agencies include the Departments of
Energy, Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Health and Human Services,
Interior, State, and Transportation, as well as the Environmental
Protection Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration,
and the National Science Foundation.
The mission of the CCTP is to focus federal research and
development activities and deployment programs more effectively to help
achieve the President's climate change goals, both near- and long-term.
The CCTP provides a forum for interagency exchange of information on
on-going R&D activities. The CCTP's multi-agency organizational
structure provides an opportunity to develop, across the Federal
Government, a comprehensive, coherent, multi-agency, multi-year plan
for the development of climate change technology. We expect a draft of
such a plan to be available in the first calendar quarter of 2004.
As the Subcommittee is aware, the recent Federal Climate Change
Expenditures Report to Congress reported that total federal
expenditures for climate change technology research, development and
deployment (RD&D) was $1.728 billion for FY 2003. The total amount
requested in the President's budget for FY 2004 was $1.759 billion. In
FY 2003, these expenditures were broken down by agency as follows:
Department of Energy, $1.583 billion; Environmental Protection Agency,
$106 million; and Department of Agriculture, $39 million. These amounts
do not include substantial additional expenditures for climate change
science ($1.722 billion) and international assistance ($276 million).
As part of our review of the federal RD&D portfolio, CCTP is
developing an inventory of federal climate change technology activities
using a set of defined criteria. This process is designed to get a more
complete picture of climate change technology RD&D by ensuring that all
CCTP member agencies analyze their portfolios using consistent
criteria. RD&D activities classified as part of the Climate Change
Technology Program (CCTP) are those activities that are relevant to
providing opportunities for:
Current and future reductions in or avoidances of
emissions of greenhouse gases;
Greenhouse gas capture and/or long-term storage,
including biological uptake and storage;
Conversion of greenhouse gases to beneficial use in
ways that avoid emissions to the atmosphere;
Monitoring and/or measurement of GHG emissions,
inventories and fluxes in a variety of settings;
Technologies that improve or displace other GHG
emitting technologies, such that the result would be reduced
GHG emissions compared to technologies they displace;
Technologies that could enable or facilitate the
development, deployment and use of other GHG-emissions
reduction technologies;
Technologies that alter, substitute for, or otherwise
replace processes, materials, and/or feedstocks, resulting in
lower net emission of GHGs;
Basic research activities undertaken explicitly to
address a technical barrier to progress of one of the above
climate change technologies.
Greenhouse gas emission reductions resulting from
clear improvements in management practices.
The development of this inventory is a very important component of
the CCTP's activities, and we look forward to sharing the results of
this work with you and your colleagues when it is complete.
CCTP Goals and Objectives
CCTP seeks to address both the President's near- and long-term
climate change goals. In the near-term, the President has committed to
the goal of reducing the greenhouse gas intensity of the U.S. economy
by 18 percent by 2012. Over the longer-term, the President has
reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to the 1992 United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change, which calls for long-term stabilization
of concentrations of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere.
The CCTP intends to develop the technological capability that will
enable both sustained economic growth and reduced risk of potential
climate change and its impacts. Accordingly, the CCTP aims to
accelerate the development and deployment of new technologies that can
significantly contribute to the accomplishment of the President's
goals.
CCTP participating agencies are pursuing research, development ,
and deployment activities, as appropriate to their specific agency
missions, that are consistent with and supportive of the development of
technology that can enable or advance the achievement of the following
CCTP goals:
Reduce or avoid emissions from energy end-use and
infrastructure
Reduce or avoid emissions from energy supply
Capture and sequester carbon dioxide (CO2)
Reduce emission of non-CO2 greenhouse
gases
The achievement of these CCTP goals will be pursued, in general, by
stimulating the science and technology enterprise of the United States,
through coordinated federal leadership of its own R&D programs, and
through partnership with others, at home and abroad. Specifically, the
CCTP seeks to pursue the following strategic objectives:
Strengthen Climate Change Technology RD&D
Strengthen Supporting Basic Research at Universities
and National Laboratories
Enhance Opportunities for Partnerships with
Businesses, States and Others
Increase International Cooperation on Related Science
and Technology
Support Cutting-Edge Demonstrations
Improve the Means for Measuring and Monitoring
Greenhouse Gases
Support Exploratory Research of Novel Concepts
Ensure the Education and Training of an Adequate
Technical Workforce
The CCTP function is interagency coordination and prioritization,
not direct support of research, development and deployment. As such,
CCTP will not advance these objectives directly, but will help agencies
and programs that comprise the CCTP to advance them by making
recommendations to reallocate and refocus resources consistent with
agency and program missions.
Principles for Determining Priority Programs
Our investments in climate change technology will be guided by a
few basic principles, which include diversification, a logical order of
technological development, systems integration, and planning in the
face of uncertainty.
Diversification of research and development activity is important
for several reasons:
The potential magnitude of the technological
challenge posed by climate change makes it extremely unlikely
that a single technology could meet such a challenge on its
own;
A diversified portfolio is a solid hedge against the
possibility that some advanced technologies may not be as
successful as hoped, while others in the portfolio could exceed
expectations;
A robust, diversified science and technology
capability will maintain the flexibility to respond to, and
assimilate, pertinent information from other countries,
institutions, or areas of scientific inquiry; and,
A diversified portfolio is better able to balance
short- and long-term technology objectives.
Sequencing of R&D investments in a logical, developmental order
requires that R&D investments should be evaluated upon:
The expected times when different technologies need
to be available and cost-effective;
The need to quickly resolve critical uncertainties;
and,
The need to demonstrate early the feasibility of
determinant technologies.
These last two points help explain our increased attention to
carbon sequestration research. If large-scale geologic sequestration is
proved successful, then continued use of fossil fuels will be possible,
and future climate change strategies could be built on existing
infrastructure for fossil fuels, thus accelerating progress and
avoiding early and costly retirement of this infrastructure. If large-
scale geologic sequestration were to prove unsuccessful, the longer-
term climate change technology portfolio will need to be adjusted
accordingly towards energy efficiency and zero-emissions technologies
such as renewable energy and nuclear power.
Our R&D investments should also include attention to technology
systems, including infrastructure, not just component technologies. The
Hydrogen Fuel Initiative is an example of adherence to this principle,
as it includes R&D activities on all aspects of the hydrogen system,
including hydrogen production, storage, and delivery technologies, as
well as fuel cells.
Finally, in setting R&D investment priorities, the CCTP recognizes
uncertainty in planning for the long-term and seeks to build a robust
portfolio of technical activities that can be successful under a number
of economic and energy policy scenarios. While nearly all such
scenarios rely heavily on further advances in energy efficiency, we
will also need significant new sources of low-carbon or zero-carbon
energy supply. Thus, some CCTP activities may focus on development of
low-carbon fossil fuel technologies that employ carbon capture and
sequestration. Other activities may focus on building a new energy
backbone, envisioning increased roles for renewable energy, hydrogen,
and advanced concepts for nuclear power. Some CCTP activities may be
focused on the long-term, more risky, but potentially transforming
technologies, such as fusion energy and advances in biotechnology. We
also want to ensure that innovative, crosscutting technology ideas with
significant potential to reduce, avoid, or sequester greenhouse gas
emissions are not overlooked.
Priorities for the National Climate Change Technology Initiative
With these principles in mind and recognizing that not all climate
change-related activities can be priorities, the CCTP will assess the
inventory of CCTP activities and use professional judgment to clearly
articulate its priorities in the context of the President's FY 2005
Budget. The priorities will likely be consistent with the
Administration's current priorities, which are well aligned with our
planning principles. Some of these priorities are highlighted below.
Hydrogen Energy. President Bush launched his Hydrogen
Fuel Initiative in this year's State of the Union address. The
goal is to work closely with the private sector to accelerate
our transition to a hydrogen economy, both on the technology of
hydrogen fuel cells and a fueling infrastructure. The
President's Hydrogen Fuel Initiative and the FreedomCAR
Partnership launched last year will provide $1.7 billion over
the next five years to develop hydrogen powered fuel cells, a
hydrogen infrastructure, and advanced automobile technologies,
allowing for commercialization by 2020. The United States will
pursue international cooperation to affect a more rapid,
coordinated advance for this technology that could lead to the
elimination of air pollutants and a significant reduction of
greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector
worldwide.
``FutureGen''--Coal-Fired, Zero-Emissions Electricity
Generation. In February 2003, President Bush announced that the
United States would sponsor, with international and private
sector partners, a $1 billion, 10-year demonstration project to
create the world's first coal-based, zero-emissions electricity
and hydrogen power plant. This project is designed to
dramatically reduce air pollution and capture and store
greenhouse gas emissions. This initiative is part of an
international Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum, chaired by
the Secretary of Energy, to work cooperatively with our global
partners, including developing countries, on research,
development and deployment of carbon sequestration technologies
in the next decade.
Fusion Energy. In January 2003, President Bush
committed the United States to participate in the largest and
most technologically sophisticated research project in the
world to harness the promise of fusion energy, the same form of
energy that powers the sun. If successful, this $5 billion,
internationally-supported research project will advance
progress toward producing clean, renewable, commercially-
available fusion energy by the middle of the century.
Participating countries include the United Kingdom, Russia,
Japan, China, and Canada.
Conclusion
Madam Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, these programs and
others like them together constitute a diverse portfolio of energy
technologies that has the potential to bring about dramatic
improvements in our energy systems with significantly reduced
greenhouse gas emissions. I look forward to working with the Members of
this Subcommittee as the Climate Change Technology Program moves
forward in evaluating, making recommendations, and reporting progress
on our technology-based approaches to address the risk of climate
change.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I would be pleased to
answer your questions.
Biography for David W. Conover
Appointed Director of the Climate Change Technology Program in
January 2003. The Climate Change Technology Program is a multi-agency
research and development (R&D) coordination activity, organized under
the auspices of the Cabinet-level Committee on Climate Change Science
and Technology Integration (CCCSTI).
Previously served as Minority Staff Director & Chief Counsel (2001-
2003), Majority Staff Director (1999-2001), and Subcommittee Counsel
(1999) to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
Prior to government service, was Federal Affairs Director for CH2M
HILL, an international environmental engineering, management and
construction company.
Received degrees from the Georgetown University Law Center and the
University of Virginia. Licensed to practice law in the Commonwealth of
Virginia.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you, Mr. Conover. Mr. Rudins, am
I pronouncing that correctly?
Mr. Rudins. That is correct. Thank you.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you.
STATEMENT OF GEORGE RUDINS, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR COAL
AND POWER SYSTEMS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
Mr. Rudins. Thank you, Madam Chairman and Members of the
Subcommittee.
In your letter of invitation, you requested I respond to
specific questions recording FutureGen and carbon
sequestration, which I attempted to do in my written statement,
which I would like to submit for the record. And in that
context, I would also like to make a short opening statement.
I am pleased to appear before you today, and in the context
of the FutureGen initiative and carbon sequestration, with much
of the Nation's attention again focused on the security of
global energy supplies, it is important to remember that we
remain an energy-rich country. Today, coal is an indispensable
part of our nation's energy mix. Because of its domestic
abundance and low cost, coal now accounts for more than half of
the electricity generated in this country, and in the future,
it can also be a source of clean hydrogen to fuel our future
transportation fleet.
The challenge to keeping low coal--low cost coal available
to fuel our economic growth is related to environmental
concerns. Environmental issues can adversely impact coal use,
especially in the long-term, if mandatory CO2
controls are required. A solution to this problem is the
development of technology options that would eliminate
environmental concerns associated with its continued use.
Over the last 30 years or so, the investment that we, the
U.S. Government and industry, have made in the development of
coal and clean coal technologies, has resulted in advancing of
the state of the art in this area to the point that it is now
possible to develop the technological capability to generate
electricity from coal, co-produce hydrogen and virtually
eliminate emissions, including the CO2 emissions
from the process, and do so, potentially, in a cost-competitive
manner.
This is what the FutureGen project is all about. FutureGen
is one of the boldest steps toward a pollution-free energy
future ever taken by our nation, and has the potential to be
one of the most important advances in energy production in the
first half of this century. FutureGen will pioneer carbon
capture and sequestration technologies on a sufficient scale
and an integrated fashion with power generation and hydrogen
co-production that it will establish, if successful, the
viability and affordability of this approach.
The ultimate goal for FutureGen is to show how new
technology can eliminate environment concerns over future use
of coal. Knowledge from FutureGen will help turn coal from a
challenging energy resource into an environmentally sustainable
energy solution.
In conclusion, coal is the workhorse of our domestic
electric power sector, but it is also critical to the economic
growth of key nations around the world. The International
Energy Agency projects a 50 percent increase in worldwide coal
use for the generation of electricity over the next quarter
century. As a result, it would be prudent to include into any
comprehensive climate strategy a technology option capable of
reducing or eliminating CO2 from the use of fossil
fuels, such as carbon sequestration.
The fact that coal will be a significant world energy
resource during the 21st Century cannot be ignored. Coal is
abundant, it is comparatively inexpensive, and will be used
widely, especially in the developing world. The global
acceptance of the concept of coal-based systems, integrated
with sequestration technology, is one of the key goals of
FutureGen. In addition, FutureGen in its ultimate configuration
could also push electric power generating efficiencies into the
60 percent range, nearly double the efficiency of today's
conventional coal-burning plants.
Thus, the FutureGen prototype plant would be a stepping
stone to commercial coal-fired power plants that not only would
be emission-free, but also would operate at unprecedented fuel
efficiencies and co-produce low-cost, clean hydrogen from coal.
With that brief statement, I would be pleased to answer any
questions you may have. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rudins follows:]
Prepared Statement of George Rudins
Madam Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:
I am pleased to appear before the Subcommittee today to discuss the
great potential that new technology, especially carbon sequestration
technology, will play in helping the Nation meet ever increasing
demands for energy in the most efficient and environmentally
responsible manner possible.
With much of the Nation's attention again focused on the security
of global energy supplies, it is important to remember that we remain
an energy-rich country.
Today, coal is an indispensable part of our nation's energy mix.
Because of its abundance and low cost, coal now accounts for more than
half of the electricity generated in this country.
Coal is our nation's most abundant domestic energy resource. One
quarter of the entire world's known coal supplies are found within the
United States. In terms of energy value (Btus), coal constitutes
approximately 95 percent of U.S. fossil energy reserves. Our nation's
recoverable coal has the energy equivalent of about one trillion
barrels of crude oil--comparable in energy content to all the world's
known oil reserves.
At present consumption rates, U.S. coal reserves are expected to
last at least 275 years.
Coal has also been an energy bargain for the United States.
Historically it has been the least expensive fossil fuel available to
the country, and in contrast to other primary fuels, its costs are
likely to decline as mine productivity continues to increase. The low
cost of coal is a major reason why the United States enjoys some of the
lowest electricity rates of any free market economy.
America produces over one billion tons of coal per year. Nearly all
of it (965 million tons) goes to U.S. power plants for the generation
of electricity.
According to the Energy Information Administration, annual domestic
coal demand is projected to increase by 394 million tons from the 2001
level of 1.050 billion tons to 1.444 billion tons in 2025, because of
projected growth in coal use for electricity generation.
Largely because of improving pollution control technologies, the
Nation has been able to use more coal while improving air quality.
While annual coal use for electric generation has increased from 320
million tons in 1970 to more than 900 million tons, sulfur dioxide
emissions from coal-fired power plants have dropped from 15.8 million
tons annually to 10.1 million tons in 2001, the most current year
available. In addition, particulates from coal-fired plants declined
some 60 percent over the same period, according to the Environmental
Protection Agency.
Because coal is America's most plentiful and readily available
energy resource, the Department of Energy (DOE) has directed
significant R&D resources at finding ways to use coal in a more
efficient, cost-effective, and environmentally benign manner.
New government-industry collaborative efforts are getting underway
pursuant to the President's Coal Research Initiative. These programs
will continue to find ways to limit emissions from power generation, at
lower costs. The goal for FutureGen, discussed later in my testimony,
is to remove environmental issues, including greenhouse gas emissions,
from the fuel choice equation by developing a coal-based zero emission
power plant.
The Next Generation of Power Plants
In the 1970's, the technology for coal-fired power plants was
generally limited to the pulverized coal boiler--a large furnace-like
unit that burns finely ground coal. As part of DOE's Clean Coal
Technology Program, DOE and industry have demonstrated higher fuel
efficiencies and superior environmental performance. For example, coal
could be gasified--turned into a combustible gas. In gaseous form,
pollutant-forming impurities can be more easily removed. Like natural
gas, gasified coal could be burned in a gas turbine-generator, and the
turbine exhaust used to power a steam turbine-generator. This
``combined cycle'' approach raised the prospects of unprecedented
increases in fuel efficiency. Gasification combined cycle (IGCC) plants
built near Tampa, Florida (TECO Project), and West Terre Haute, Indiana
(Wabash River Project), are among the cleanest, most efficient coal
plants in the world. The Wabash River Project, which is a repowering of
an existing coal-fired unit, resulted in a 30-fold decrease in SO2
and a five-fold decrease in NOX emissions. These projects have recently
completed their demonstration phases and are entering commercial
operations.
The progress to date in developing these two IGCC demonstration
projects--now in commercial service--has laid the foundation for
broader application of IGCC.
FutureGen--Zero Emissions From Cutting Edge Technology
Earlier this year, President Bush and Secretary of Energy Abraham
announced plans for the United States to build--with international and
private sector partners--a cost-shared fossil fuel power plant of the
future called FutureGen. It is one of the boldest steps toward a
pollution-free energy future ever taken by our nation and has the
potential to be one of the most important advances in energy production
in the first half of this century.
This demonstration power plant will accommodate some cutting-edge
technologies to the core demonstration facility. FutureGen will be a
cost-shared $1 billion venture. While there has been no final decision
on the appropriate cost-sharing, and 80/20 cost-share may be
appropriate for those FutureGen activities that are prototype or basic
research in nature and do not involve commercial demonstration.
Demonstration activities would be cost-shared at 50/50. FutureGen will
combine electricity and hydrogen production with the virtual
elimination of emissions of such air pollutants as sulfur dioxide,
nitrogen oxides and mercury, as well as carbon dioxide, a greenhouse
gas.
The Department envisions that FutureGen would be sized to generate
the equivalent of approximately 275 megawatts of electricity, roughly
equal to an average mid-size coal-fired power plant. It will turn coal
into a hydrogen-rich gas, rather than burning it directly. The hydrogen
could then be combusted in a turbine or used in a fuel cell to produce
clean electricity, fed to a refinery to help upgrade petroleum
products, or used as a fuel for a future hydrogen economy.
It will provide other benefits as well. FutureGen could provide a
zero emissions technology option for the transportation sector--a
sector that accounts for one-third of our nation's carbon dioxide
emissions.
In the future, the plant could become a model for the production of
coal-based hydrogen with zero emissions to power the new fleet of
hydrogen-powered cars and trucks envisioned as part of President Bush's
Hydrogen Fuel Initiative. Using our abundant, readily available, low-
cost coal to produce hydrogen--an environmentally superior
transportation fuel--would help ensure America's energy security.
Carbon sequestration will be one of the primary features that will
set the FutureGen plant apart from other electric power projects.
Engineers will design into the plant advanced capabilities to capture
the carbon dioxide. No other electricity power plant in the world has
been built with this capability.
Once captured, carbon dioxide will be injected deep underground,
into brackish reservoirs that lay thousands of feet below the surface
of much of the United States, or into oil or gas reservoirs, or into
unmineable coal seams or volcanic basalt formations. Once entrapped in
these formations, the greenhouse gas would be permanently isolated from
the atmosphere.
The project will seek to sequester carbon dioxide emissions at an
operating rate of one million metric tons or more of carbon dioxide
sequestered per year. We will work with the appropriate domestic and
international communities to establish standardized technologies and
protocols for carbon dioxide measuring, monitoring, and verification.
The FutureGen plant will pioneer carbon sequestration technologies
tied to power plants on a scale that will help determine whether this
approach to 21st century carbon management is viable and affordable.
What are the Most Important Outstanding Technical Issues Associated
With Geological Sequestration?
Integrated operation of energy production and sequestration in the
FutureGen facility is required to establish that technical issues
associated with sequestration are of no concern or can be readily
managed during operation. Potential issues include downtime of CO2
separation processes, and corrosion or plugging of the sequestration
pipeline, wellbore, and formation, and leakage of sequestered
CO2.
Geologic Sequestration can be divided into four overarching
categories: Transport; Storage; Measurement/ Monitoring/Verification
(MM&V); and Infrastructure. For each of these areas, a brief
description of R&D approaches being taken to overcome outstanding
technical issues is provided. For Transport, R&D is developing an
increased understanding and best practice strategies to minimize
corrosion. For Storage, R&D is developing best practice strategies to
identify optimal locations for candidate geologic reservoirs and
reservoir management practices to maximize CO2 storage. This
R&D will provide FutureGen with site selection guidelines and reservoir
management practices throughout the lifespan of FutureGen. MM&V is
critical to ensure permanence and safety of CO2
sequestration. R&D is developing technologies to minimize leakage and
ensure permanent storage to below 0.01 percent leakage per year.
Developments in sub-surface tracking relative to seismic, gravitational
and logging technologies are evolving to where movement of very small
amounts of CO2 in reservoir can be tracked. Methods to track
surface leakage are being developed to identify small surface leaks at
nearly any point above the surface of a geologic formation. Lastly, for
Infrastructure, the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum and Regional
Carbon Sequestration Partnerships are developing the infrastructure,
regulatory framework, and other sequestration protocols that are
critical to both FutureGen deployment and, more importantly, subsequent
widespread deployment of the integrated FutureGen power plant.
What Technical Questions Will the FutureGen Project Be Designed To
Address?
FutureGen will focus on integrating and demonstrating the
technology needed to economically remove the environmental constraints
associated with producing energy from coal, especially those associated
with the CO2 emissions. The FutureGen project will
demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of zero-emission
power plants by integrating the production of electricity and hydrogen
from coal with the capture and permanent sequestration of CO2
generated in the process. FutureGen will employ coal gasification
technology, integrated with combined-cycle electricity generation,
hydrogen production, and capture and sequestration of CO2.
The goal of FutureGen is to conclusively show that using coal to
produce electricity and hydrogen with zero or near-zero carbon
emissions is a viable approach for carbon management. To prove
viability, the sequestration technology needs to be demonstrated at a
meaningful scale under real-world conditions. This requires the
operation of a large scale, integrated system. FutureGen may also
accommodate some cutting-edge technologies to produce electricity and
hydrogen, which would need to be integrated with CO2
sequestration technologies. Monitoring and verifying the permanence of
CO2 sequestration is a key part of the project. The geologic
formations into which the CO2 will be sequestered will be
heavily instrumented to monitor and verify the permanence of CO2
storage. Monitoring and verification of the amount of CO2
sequestered are critical issues in public acceptance of sequestration.
Other elements are to: maximize storage potential; track CO2
movement in the geologic formation; monitor for and mitigate surface
leakage, if it occurs; and integration of CO2 capture and
storage with the co-production of hydrogen and electricity.
Is Our Current State of Knowledge Sufficient To Proceed With A Large
Scale Demonstration Project?
Our state of knowledge is sufficient to proceed with a large scale
demonstration project. The use of sequestration to reduce CO2
emissions is a relatively new idea. DOE's sequestration program is only
six years old--a short time for a major technology development program.
However, for more than 40 years the petroleum industry has injected
CO2 into depleted oil and gas fields for enhanced oil
recovery and the disposal of acid gases that are produced from some gas
and oil wells. The primary components of acid gas are CO2
(typically up to 90 percent), hydrogen sulfide, and other trace
contaminants. Hydrogen sulfide is lighter than CO2 and has a
strong smell even at concentrations of a few parts per million, making
it easy to detect. No significant leaks of hydrogen sulfide have been
reported over the years. Over 70 CO2 enhanced oil recovery
projects inject more than eight million tons of CO2 per year
into oil reservoirs throughout the United States and Canada. Many of
these projects have been injecting at these levels for more than 20
years. The risk of catastrophic release of CO2 is almost
non-existent. No known hazardous CO2 leaks have ever been
associated with leakage from a geologic formation.
Two large-scale carbon sequestration projects exist today. The
first project is the offshore Sleipner facility, owned and operated by
Statoil, Norway's state oil company. Located beneath the North Sea, the
Sleipner field is one of the world's largest natural-gas fields, and is
characterized by a high concentration of CO2, typically
around nine percent. To produce pipeline-quality natural gas, Statoil
strips the excess CO2 from the recovered gas on its offshore
production platform. The CO2 is then injected into a saline
reservoir 1,000 meters below the seabed. Since 1996, Statoil has
injected one million metric tons of CO2 per year. The
project is partially driven by a Norwegian tax credit of up to $35 per
metric ton of CO2 sequestered.
The recently initiated Weyburn Project is the only other large-
scale CO2 sequestration effort in existence. This project,
organized by the Department of Natural Resources of Canada, has the
dual purpose of enhanced oil recovery and carbon sequestration. Carbon
dioxide from the Great Plains Synfuels plant in Beulah, North Dakota is
pumped 200 miles to the Weyburn oil field in southeastern Saskatchewan.
Over the project's 20-year lifetime, 20 million metric tons of CO2
will be injected into the Weyburn field. DOE's sequestration program is
supporting extensive measurement, monitoring, and verification efforts
for both the Sleipner and Weyburn large-scale projects.
How Did the Department Choose The Scale and Scope of FutureGen?
FutureGen will be designed to operate at a nominal 275 MW (net
equivalent output), and may accommodate some cutting-edge technologies
into the demonstration plant to produce electricity and hydrogen
integrated with CO2 sequestration technologies. This size is
driven by the requirement for producing relevant data and by the
requirement for producing one million metric tons per year of CO2
to adequately validate the integrated operation of the gasification
plant and the receiving geologic formation. Full scale demonstration is
necessary to adequately address the integration issues including
sequestration.
Since FutureGen is a first-of-a-kind project, the key cost risks
include integration of advanced technologies for power and hydrogen
generation with sequestration, and technologies at full-scale to
capture and sequester large quantities of CO2.
How Did the Department Determine the Cost of This Project?
Estimated project cost is based on cost experiences with other
projects including ongoing large-scale sequestration projects as
described earlier, and past coal gasification projects of similar size.
DOE also accounted for the cost associated with using advanced
technology, built-in flexibility features to accommodate possible
testing of cutting edge subsystems and components, required
instrumentation, the integration aspects between the power facility and
the sequestration facility, and finally the operational costs for the
demonstration period. On the basis of prior experience with first-of-a-
kind power projects, DOE projects a total project cost of $1 billion.
What Levels of Funding Will Be Provided by Industry and International
Partners?
The funding required to accomplish FutureGen is expected to be $1
billion. A private-sector share of 20 percent will be required for
those activities that are prototype or basic research in nature and do
not include commercial demonstration while those activities that are
commercial demonstration will be cost-shared at 50/50. DOE is also
pursuing funding participation from domestic (e.g., states) and foreign
government entities.
What Factors Will the Department Consider Regarding Site Selection For
Geological Sequestration Projects and Experiments?
Site selection must consider many factors. Three considerations are
the feedstock, use of the products (electric power, hydrogen, and other
by-products), and sequestration options. The ideal location requires
geologic formations that may be the best suited candidates for large-
scale facilities. However, final site selection will be based on
comprehensive criteria derived from detailed geologic assessment.
The reservoir(s) selected for sequestration will be representative
of geologic sites commonly available throughout the United States. The
candidate geologic formations include unmineable coal seams, depleted
oil and natural gas reservoirs, deep saline reservoirs, or other
formations. Geologic sequestration may be coupled with resource
recovery in projects such as enhanced oil recovery or coalbed methane
recovery.
What Work Should Be Done Prior to FutureGen Site Selection?
DOE plans to perform due diligence activities prior to site
selection. The Sequestration R&D program, Regional Partnerships and
Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum will work to identify the most
appropriate areas of the country for candidate sequestration
formations. A Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS) will
be initiated in fiscal year 2004 which will identify environmental
issues related to geologic site selection and provide guidelines for
geologic site selection activities to support FutureGen.
Conclusion
The ultimate goal for the FutureGen project is to show how advanced
coal-based generation using carbon sequestration technology can
eliminate environmental concerns over the future use of coal and allow
the Nation to realize the full potential of its abundant coal resources
to meet our energy needs. FutureGen will show that coal, an
environmentally challenging energy resource, can be an environmentally
sustainable energy solution.
The fact that coal will be a significant world energy resource
during the 21st century cannot be ignored. Coal is abundant, it is
comparatively inexpensive, and it will be used widely, especially in
the developing world. Global acceptance of the concept of coal-based
systems integrated with sequestration technology is one of the key
goals of FutureGen.
Thus, FutureGen will demonstrate the commercial viability of a
coal-fired power plant that not only will be emission-free but also
will operate at unprecedented fuel efficiencies and co-produce low/
cost, clean hydrogen from coal.
This completes my prepared statement. I would be happy to answer
any questions you may have.
Biography for George Rudins
Mr. George Rudins has been with the Department of Energy (or ERDA -
its predecessor agency) since 1975. Currently the Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Coal and Power Systems, within the agency's Office of
Fossil Energy, Rudins has served in this position since 1998. Previous
to that time, Rudins' assignments within the Office of Fossil Energy
included: Assistant Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coal R&D; Director
of the Office of Advanced Power Systems; Director of the Office of
Advanced Energy Conversion Systems; and, Director of the Office of
Magneto-Hydrodynamic (MHD) Systems. In conjunction with these
assignments, Rudins' management responsibilities included oversight of
the Clean Coal Technology Demonstration Program, the Coal Research and
Development Program, the Power Plant Emissions Control Research
Program, the Fuel Cell Research Program, the Gas Turbine Research
Program, the MHD Research Program, the Coal Fuel/Diesel Engine Research
Program, and others. Rudins' performance in his various assignments has
been recognized through a number of awards, including a Presidential
Rank Award. Before joining the Department of Energy, Rudins was with
the Rand Corporation (1970-1975); prior to this he was with the
National Academy of Sciences. Rudins received a B.A. from Rutgers
University in 1966.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you very much, Mr. Rudins. Dr.
Benson.
STATEMENT OF DR. SALLY M. BENSON, DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR
OPERATIONS, LAWRENCE BERKELEY NATIONAL LABORATORY
Dr. Benson. Chairman Biggert and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to provide
testimony on this important and timely topic.
I am Dr. Sally Benson, a hydrogeologist at Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory, and I have been working on this
since 1999, with a team of geologists at my laboratory.
Today, nearly two million tons of CO2 are
sequestered annually in geologic formations at the Sleipner
Project in the North Sea, and at the Weyburn oil field in
Canada. More commercial projects are planned in Algeria,
Australia and offshore Norway. In addition to these successful
commercial projects, the existence of naturally-occurring
CO2 reservoirs proves that CO2 can be
sequestered for hundreds of thousands of years or more.
Depleted oil and gas reservoirs are especially promising
for long-term sequestration, because they have seals that have
stood the test of time. They are also attractive because
CO2 sequestration can be combined with enhanced oil
recover, a mature technology that is applicable to 80 percent
of oil reservoirs.
The availability of a low-cost and abundant supply of
CO2 could be a boon to the domestic oil industry. A
similar idea can be applied to enhance the recovery of natural
gas from deep coal beds. Now, to answer your question about the
most important outstanding technical issues, sandstone
reservoirs filled with salt water, such as the Mount Simon
Formation in the Midwest, the Frio Formation along the Texas
Gulf Coast and the Central Valley of California are estimated
to have the capacity to store hundreds of years of CO2
emissions at today's rates. That natural gas has been stored at
over 50 aquifer storage sites in the U.S. alone demonstrates
that appropriately-sited projects can safely and effectively
sequester CO2 underground.
The best sequestration sites will be at depths between
three quarters and two miles deep, have a thick sequence of
permeable and porous sands, and be overlain by at least one
thick and continuous seal. However, site selection criteria
have yet to be developed, and capacity estimates have not yet
been validated by regional or site-specific experiments.
Monitoring to verify that CO2 is safely and
effectively sequestered, or to provide early warning in the
event that a project is failing, is also needed. Methods
developed by the oil and gas industry, such as 3-D seismic
surveys, or injection well pressure monitoring, can be used,
but more studies are needed to develop standard protocols for
monitoring.
Computer models that predict the performance of
sequestration projects are also needed. While reservoir
simulation is a mature technology, the capability of today's
models need to be extended to include accurate representation
of the geochemical and geomechanical processes that are
important for geologic sequestration. These need--models need
to be validated by a number of site-specific studies that cover
the range of geologic settings that could be used for CO2
sequestration.
The potential environmental consequences of geologic
sequestration are also well understood, based on analogous
experience from the oil and gas industry, natural gas storage,
EPA's Underground Injection Control Program and places such as
Perrier in France, where CO2 naturally seeps to the
ground surface. The highest probability risks are associated
with improper injection well completions, abandoned wells and
inadequate characterization of the sequestration site. Over
time, technologies and monitoring protocols have, however, been
developed to manage and mitigate these concerns.
To summarize, geologic sequestration of CO2 is
in practice today and more is planned. However, to fully
evaluate the potential for large-scale application, a research
program that combines site-specific field studies with a
directed research program must be pursued.
Now, to answer your question about what portion of these
uncertainties could be reduced by additional research, well,
all of them can be. However, because of the site-specific
nature of the factors that provide secure storage, pilot tests
should be located in each of the regions where there are large
concentrations of stationary CO2 sources. While many
of these issues can be addressed by small-scale pilot tests,
eventually, full-scale demonstration projects will be needed.
So are we ready for full-scale demonstration projects? Well,
clearly, the experience at Sleipner and Weyburn in Canada
demonstrate that we are ready today. However, before we can
embark on this, potential sites need to be screened, pilot
tests need to be carried out, including demonstrating that our
models and monitoring methods are adequate and risk assessment
is needed.
So, in summary, geologic sequestration is an important
component of a climate change technology portfolio. It offers
the potential for deep reductions in CO2 emissions,
while allowing the continued use of fossil fuels. Efforts are
underway to address these issues and success can be assured by
a sustained commitment to an adequate program of directed
research, pilot tests and full-scale demonstration.
Thank you for your attention.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Benson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Sally M. Benson
Questions
1. What are the most important outstanding technical issues
associated with geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide
(CO2)? Please describe the geologic, environmental,
economic, and technical uncertainties. What portion of these
uncertainties could be reduced through additional research?
2. Is our state of knowledge sufficient to proceed with a
full-scale carbon sequestration demonstration project? By
concentrating funding in one large project, do we run the risk
of moving to large-scale sequestration before the technical
uncertainties have been adequately addressed?
3. What factors should the Department consider in selecting
geological sites for carbon sequestration projects and
research? What work should be done prior to selection of the
FutureGen site?
4. What are the costs of CO2 injection? How
directly do the injection technologies developed for secondary
recovery of oil apply to the injection of CO2 for
sequestration?
Testimony
Chairman Biggert and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to provide testimony on this important and timely topic. I
am Dr. Sally Benson, a hydrogeologist. I work at the Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory and since 1999 I have led a team of earth
scientists working on geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide
(CO2).
Carbon dioxide capture and sequestration in deep geologic
formations can provide greater than 90 percent reduction in CO2
emissions from stationary sources such as power plants. The idea was
first developed in the late 1970's but did not get much attention until
the late 1980's when scientists began to look in earnest for solutions
to the climate change problem. Since that time it has emerged as one of
the most promising options for deeply reducing CO2 emissions
while continuing to use fossil fuels.
Before answering your specific questions, let me first provide some
background information.
Today nearly two million tons of CO2 are sequestered
annually in geologic formations at the Sleipner Project in the North
Sea and in the Weyburn oil field in Canada. More commercial projects
are planned in Algeria, Australia and off-shore Norway. CO2
can be sequestered in sedimentary basins made up of alternating layers
of sandstones, carbonates, evaporites and shales. The sandstone layers
typically provide the reservoir and the shale or evaporites provide
seals to trap fluids or gases deep below the land surface. The
existence of naturally occurring CO2 reservoirs proves that
CO2 can be sequestered for hundreds of thousands of years or
more. In addition many oil and gas reservoirs also contain large
quantities of CO2 confirming that oil and gas reservoirs can
also contain CO2.
Depleted oil and gas reservoirs are especially promising for long-
term sequestration because they have seals that have stood the test of
time. They are also attractive because CO2 sequestration can
be combined with enhanced oil and gas recovery. During the early stages
of a sequestration project the remaining oil can be swept from the
reservoir. Eventually, oil production will stop and the reservoir can
be filled to capacity for long-term sequestration of CO2.
This is a mature technology and an estimated 80 percent of oil
reservoirs are suitable for CO2 enhanced oil recovery. The
availability of an abundant low-cost supply of CO2 could be
a boon to the domestic oil industry. A similar idea can be applied to
enhance the recovery of natural gas from deep coal beds. Tests of this
concept are underway in the San Juan Basin in New Mexico.
Now, returning to your first question about the most important
outstanding technical issues, most of them are about sequestering
CO2 in deep salt-water filled sandstones. Sandstone
formations filled with salt-water, such as the Mount Simon Formation in
the Midwest, the Frio Formation along the Texas Gulf Coast, and the
Central Valley in California, are estimated to have the capacity to
accommodate hundreds of years of CO2 emissions at today's
rates. That natural gas has been stored at over 50 aquifer storage
sites in the U.S. alone, demonstrates that appropriately sited projects
can safely and effectively sequester CO2 underground. The
best sequestration sites will be at depths between three-quarters and
two miles deep, have several hundred feet of porous and permeable
sands, and be overlain by at least one thick and continuous seal.
However, site selection criteria have not been developed and capacity
estimates have not yet been validated by regional or site-specific
field experiments.
So far, I have only discussed the potential for physically trapping
CO2 in deep geologic formations. Sequestration can be even
more secure if the CO2 dissolves in water or is converted to
minerals such as calcium carbonate. While we know that these
geochemical reactions will occur slowly, we don't know exactly how slow
or how much to expect. This is another important area for research.
Monitoring to verify that CO2 is safely and effectively
sequestered, or to provide early warning in the event that a project is
failing, is also needed. Methods developed by the oil and gas industry
such as injection well pressure monitoring and 3-D seismic surveys can
be used. But more site-specific studies are needed to demonstrate their
sensitivity and to develop standard protocols for monitoring. New
remote-sensing techniques for directly verifying sequestration would
also be valuable.
Computer models that predict the performance of a sequestration
project also need to be verified. While reservoir simulation is a
mature technology, the capability of today's models need to be extended
to include accurate representation of geochemical and geomechanical
processes that are important for geologic sequestration. These models
need to be validated by a number of site specific studies that cover
the range of geologic settings that could be used for CO2
sequestration.
The potential environmental consequences of geologic sequestration
are well understood based on analogous experience from the oil and gas
industry, natural gas storage, EPA's Underground Injection Control
Program and places such as Perrier in France where CO2
naturally seeps out at the ground surface. The highest probability
risks are associated with improper injection well completions,
abandoned wells and inadequate characterization of the sequestration
site. Over time, technologies and monitoring protocols have been
developed to manage and mitigate these concerns. Implemented on a small
scale, in a well characterized geologic setting, geologic sequestration
poses no unique or poorly understood risks. However, after the best
characterized and most secure sites are filled, a significant
characterization and risk assessment effort will be needed to
accommodate additional CO2 sequestration.
To summarize about the most important outstanding technical issues,
geologic sequestration of CO2 is in practice today and more
is planned. It builds upon a technology base developed over more than
one-half a century by the oil and gas industry. However, to fully
evaluate and realize the potential for large-scale application, site-
specific field studies and a core directed-research program are needed.
Specifically, the combined program must:
Provide regionally validated estimates of
sequestration capacity;
Enhance our understanding of the geochemical
reactions and geomechanical processes that enhance or
compromise sequestration security;
Provide validated approaches to modeling and
monitoring; and
Perform regional and site-specific risk assessments.
To answer your question about what portion of these uncertainties
can be reduced by additional research, all of them can be with a
research program that combines regionally-relevant pilot-tests with a
core directed-research program. Because the regional and site-specific
nature of the factors that provide secure geologic sequestration,
pilot-tests should be located in each of the regions with a large
concentration of stationary CO2 sources. While many of these
issues can be addressed by small scale pilot-tests, eventually, full
scale demonstration projects will be needed.
With regard to the committee's second and third questions, are we
ready for a full-scale demonstration and what work is needed before a
site is selected? The full-scale geologic sequestration projects at
Sleipner and Weyburn attest to this fact that a full-scale
demonstration can be carried out today. However, first, potential sites
need to be screened, pilot-tests must be carried out, including
demonstrating that our models and monitoring methods are adequate, a
risk assessment is needed and permits must be obtained.
To answer your fourth question, estimated costs for geologic
sequestration of CO2 range from about $3 to $10 per ton,
depending on site specific considerations such as how many injection
wells are needed, surface facilities, economy of scale and monitoring
requirements. As the technology matures, uncertainties in costs will be
reduced. These costs are small fraction of the cost of CO2
capture and consequently have not been the focus of much attention.
In summary, geologic sequestration is an important component of a
climate change technology portfolio. It offers the potential for deep
reductions in CO2 emissions while allowing continued use of
fossil fuels. Efforts are underway to address the important technical
issues and success can be assured by a sustained commitment to an
adequate program of directed-research, pilot-tests at regionally
relevant sites and full-scale demonstration.
Biography for Sally M. Benson
Dr. Sally M. Benson is the Deputy Director for Operations at Ernest
Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. In addition to this
administrative position, she is a staff scientist in the Earth Sciences
Division of the Laboratory. A lead researcher in her field, Dr. Benson
has addressed a range of issues related to energy and the environment,
including environmental remediation, gas storage, and geothermal energy
production. In many recent years she has focused her research on carbon
sequestration, particularly on sequestration in deep geologic
formations.
Dr. Benson is the Director of the GEO-SEQ Project, a National
Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) sponsored project. She continues to
work on providing safe and cost-effective methods for geologic
sequestration of CO2. She has authored or co-authored an
abundance of scientific publications on the subject. Currently, she is
a coordinating lead author for the ``Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC) Special Report on CO2 Capture and Storage.''
Dr. Benson often travels, both throughout the United States and abroad,
to lecture about her scientific research.
A graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University with a B.A. in
Geology, she completed her education in 1988 at the University of
California, Berkeley, receiving her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Materials
Science and Mineral Engineering. Dr. Benson serves on numerous
committees, such as the Carbon Mitigation Initiative (CMI) Advisory
Board and the CO2 Capture Project/British Petroleum (CCP/BP)
Technology Advisory Board. In 1996, Dr. Benson was awarded the
Department of Energy Certificate of Appreciation for her lead in the
development of the Natural and Accelerated Bioremediation Research
Program Plan.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you, Doctor. And Dr. Brown.
STATEMENT OF DR. MARILYN A. BROWN, ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND
RENEWABLE ENERGY PROGRAM, OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORY
Dr. Brown. Good morning, Chairman Biggert and Members of
the House Subcommittee. Thank you for inviting me to comment on
the subject of climate change technologies.
Let us start with the issue of portfolio balance. One needs
to consider all of the standard dimensions, such as the
benefits, that is, the greenhouse gas emission reductions, the
other benefits that might result, the ancillary, productivity
and safety and security and health and pollution reductions
that could occur. You have got to consider the costs, the R&D
and other costs, equity concerns, who pays, who wins, as well
as looking at the full spectrum of ways that carbon atmospheric
concentrations can be reduced.
And in doing that, I like to divide those methods into
three categories. One is ways of reducing the energy intensity
of the Nation's economy, using less energy per GDP, and to do
that, you can employ various energy efficiency technologies, or
you can use system enhancements, such as locating power
generation near to facilities that can take advantage of the
heat, waste heat, that is produced at those facilities.
A second way is to reduce the carbon intensity of the
energy system. Here, you turn to ways of producing energy using
less carbon intensity, so renewable energy, nuclear energy,
those are some of the approaches that would work there. And
third is carbon sequestration, where you, as Dr. Benson and Mr.
Rudins have focused on some of those technologies.
There was a study completed in the late 1990's by 11
national laboratories that used the typology I just mentioned,
energy intensity, carbon intensity and carbon sequestration,
and enumerated hundreds of specific approaches in each of those
three categories, and concluded that there is a relationship
between those categories, and the time horizon required to
produce cost-effective solutions, and the most cost-effective
solutions that exist today are in the energy intensity
reduction category, that is, in the energy efficiency arena. It
is going to take another decade or two, possibly three, for the
other approaches to become cost-effective.
So, let us talk about the no regret strategy you asked me
to address. Many studies have documented that the Nation has a
significant reservoir of cost-effective energy efficiency
opportunities. Focusing on these technologies has been called a
no regrets approach, because it promotes the investments--it
promotes investments that would be good for the consumer and
good for the environment. It is also sometimes called the
double dividends approach for that reason.
As an example, let us look at the experience of the
Department of Energy's Best Practices Program, which has
developed industrial plant assessment tools to try to reduce
the consumption of energy at industrial plants in the areas of
steam, air--compressed air, motors and drive systems. I like to
use that as an example, because they have documented so
carefully the powerful amount of opportunity that exists in
these manufacturing facilities to save energy. In the first
five plant assessments that were done by this program, they
documented $17 million worth of savings that, in fact, not only
could be achieved, but were achieved following the completion
of these assessments. And subsequently, they have done a total
of 28 assessments, and have shown that there is an aggregate
savings potential of $163 million in just 28 plants.
A study by five national laboratories that was completed in
the year 2000 tried to itemize the opportunities one by one
available to the Nation to reduce CO2, and they
concluded that over the next 20 years, we could reduce our
energy consumption by 20 percent, and our carbon dioxide
emissions by 31 percent, if we put in place an aggressive set
of policies to try to deal with the market imperfections that
are hindering these technologies from advancing into the
marketplace.
The 31 percent of carbon reductions were driven by--two
thirds of those reductions were the result of energy efficiency
improvement, one third by low carbon technologies and it is
assumed that following those technology advances, we would soon
see carbon sequestration delivering that next decade of
opportunities, allowing the Nation to consider--continue to use
fossil fuels, and meet the need for even greater carbon
reductions.
Well, what kind of evidence do we have that if you were to
put in place an aggressive set of policies and programs,
including much more R&D, that we would in fact deliver viable
technology options that consumers would buy? Take a look at the
National Academy's report that was published earlier this year
that looked at several dozen energy efficiency projects
completed by the Department of Energy. They concluded that
these several dozen projects generated economic benefits of $30
billion, far exceeding the $7 billion which constituted the
entire Department of Energy's efficiency budget over that time
period.
Just to bring that home, consider one particular project,
which dealt with the household refrigerator. In the year 1970,
your household refrigerator consumed nearly 2,000 kilowatt-
hours a year of electricity. Well, as a result of a very
aggressive public/private research partnership, today, the
average new refrigerator requires only one third of that
electricity.
Well, what about the future? Where are we going to find
these similar savings? What should we invest in, in terms of
promising research? Earlier this year, the Department of
Energy's Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee, called BSAC,
published a report that documents the physical science, basic
energy sciences, that could deliver the fundamental
breakthroughs that we will need in order to continue to keep
the pipeline of cost-effective technologies full. That is, they
documented that energy efficiency and the no regrets approach
is not a short-lived phenomenon, that through continued science
and technology investments, we can provide even better
technology solutions well into the next several decades.
Consider some of the materials breakthroughs that have
occurred recently, nickel aluminide alloys, for instance, are
being used in plants----
Chairwoman Biggert. Draw your----
Dr. Benson. Oh, great.
Chairwoman Biggert [continuing]. Testimony to a conclusion.
I know we will have questions for you, though.
Dr. Benson. Okay. Some of the most exciting scientific
advancements have been in the materials area.
In conclusion, energy conservation does not have the
rugged, romantic appeal of oil drilling or coal mining. It
doesn't wow us with massive dams or dramatic cooling towers, or
a large power--solar power towers. It is somewhat invisible,
and yet, it does make a tremendous amount of energy available,
prevents pollution and avoids emissions of greenhouse gas
reductions.
To secure such double dividends in the future, we need to
move forward on three major fronts: on policies to address
market barriers, market imperfections, R&D to accelerate
technology advancements and programs to facilitate technology
deployment.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Brown follows:]
Prepared Statement of Marilyn A. Brown
Chairman Biggert and Members of the Energy Subcommittee, thank you
for inviting me to comment on the subject of climate change
technologies. You have asked me to address three issues:
the attributes of a balanced climate change
technology portfolio,
the ``no regrets'' strategy of targeting cost-
effective, energy-efficient measures, and
the non-climate benefits of federal climate change
R&D investments.
Many of my comments on these issues are drawn from a study
completed in November 2000, called the Scenarios for a Clean Energy
Future. This study, which I co-led, examined the ability of energy-
efficient and clean energy technologies to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas
emissions. It was commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE),
was co-funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and was
completed by researchers from five DOE national laboratories.\1\ My
comments draw on other research, as well, including Technology
Opportunities to Reduce U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emission (a.k.a. the ``11-
Lab Study'')\2\ and a recent workshop on Basic Research Needs to Assure
a Secure Energy Future.\3\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The report can be found at http://www.ornl.gov/ORNL/
Energy-Eff/CEF.html
\2\ The report can be found at http://www.ornl.gov/
climate-change
\3\ The report can be found at http://www.sc.doe.gov/production/
bes/BESAC/reports.html
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Attributes of a Balanced Climate Change Technology Portfolio
The balance of a climate change technology portfolio can be
evaluated along many dimensions. These include market and technical
risk; time-to-market introduction (near-, medium-, and long-term); size
of potential greenhouse gas emissions reductions; magnitude and nature
of other benefits; R&D investment requirements and other costs; and
distributional impacts (by region, income group, etc.). For carbon
dioxide, the most important of the greenhouse gases, the RD&D portfolio
for climate change should also consider the full spectrum of ways that
carbon concentrations in the atmosphere can be reduced. These include:
reducing the ``energy intensity'' of the economy
(that is, total energy use divided by the gross domestic
product),
reducing the ``carbon intensity'' of the energy
system (that is, carbon emissions per unit of energy consumed),
and
removing atmospheric carbon through
``sequestration.''
These three approaches embody distinct technology pathways to
reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Energy intensity can be decreased
through the more efficient use of fossil fuels in transportation,
buildings and industry and through system designs such as co-locating
facilities that produce both electrical power and heat with facilities
that need them. Carbon intensity can be decreased by increasing the
efficiency of energy production, or by using either fuels that emit
less carbon or technologies that use lower carbon-emitting fuels such
as nuclear power plants and renewable energy sources such as
hydroelectric, wind, and solar power plants. Ways to increase carbon
sequestration include capturing and storing CO2 after
combustion but before it enters the atmosphere, and increasing the rate
at which oceans, forests, and soils absorb CO2 from the
atmosphere.
To reduce carbon emissions significantly while sustaining economic
growth, all three of these technology avenues may be needed. The 11-Lab
Study concluded that these three approaches have different time
dimensions. The report concluded that:
In the first decade of this century significant
advances in energy efficiency technologies could deliver
substantial near-term carbon-reducing impacts by decreasing the
energy intensity of the U.S. economy.
Along with continued improvements in energy
efficiency, research-based advances in clean energy
technologies could reduce significantly the carbon intensity of
the U.S. energy economy during the second decade. A wide range
of improved renewable, fossil, and nuclear technologies could
be introduced and widely deployed in this period.
Complementing ongoing advances in efficiency and
clean energy technologies well into the third decade, carbon
sequestration technologies could add a third important
dimension to the package of solutions. Success in this
technology area could enable the Nation to continue its
extensive use of fossil fuels without harming the global
climate.
The ``No Regrets'' Strategy of Targeting Cost-Effective, Energy-
Efficient Measures
Like many other analyses, the Scenarios for a Clean Energy Future
study described a large reservoir of highly cost-effective energy-
efficient technologies that are available for deployment. Climate
change strategies that focus on these technologies have been called
``no regrets'' approaches because they promote technologies that would
be good for consumers and the economy irrespective of their climate
change benefits. The fact that such technologies remain under exploited
leads to two key questions. If energy-efficient technology is cost-
effective, why isn't more of it being used? If individuals and
businesses can make money from energy efficiency, why don't they just
do it?
Although some like to assert that markets are perfect, practical
experience tells us otherwise. Energy markets, like all markets, are
plagued by imperfections that can impede the adoption of new products,
even those that are beneficial and economical. These market failures
include:
Misplaced incentives (for instance, these often occur
in apartment buildings where landlords pay the utility bills,
giving tenants no incentive to conserve)
Distorting fiscal and regulatory policies (for
example, electricity rates that do not reflect the real-time
cost of electricity production)
Unpriced costs (such as the health problems
associated with burning hydrocarbons)
Unpriced benefits (such as the public benefits
associated with energy R&D: because the benefits of private-
sector investments in R&D extend beyond any individual firm,
investments are insufficient from a public perspective).
The existence of market failures that inhibit investment in
improved energy technologies is a primary driver for public policy
intervention. In many cases, feasible, low-cost policies and programs
can be put in place to eliminate or compensate for market
imperfections, enabling markets to operate more efficiently for the
benefit of society.
As one example, consider DOE's Best Practices Program, which has
developed plant assessment and analysis tools and has conducted plant-
wide assessments of energy-saving opportunities. The goal is to address
key information barriers to the adoption of energy-efficient measures.
Improvements to industrial utility systems (steam, compressed air,
motors, and pumps, etc.) offer tremendous energy-saving opportunities.
Industrial motor systems, for example, use 25 percent of all the
electricity consumed in the United States. In just five of the
program's initial industrial assessment projects, annual energy savings
of $17 million were realized, with an average payback on investment of
1.2 years. Altogether, the 28 assessments conducted to date have
identified aggregate savings of $163 million (390,000 MWh/yr of
electricity and 10 trillion Btu/yr of natural gas). Full implementation
of such energy-efficient technologies could save 10 to 20 percent of
the power used in motor-driven industrial systems, saving billions of
dollars annually.
The Scenarios for a Clean Energy Future study concludes that
accelerating the development and deployment of energy-efficient
technologies could significantly reduce air pollution and greenhouse
gas emissions, oil dependence, and economic inefficiencies, at no net
cost to the economy. The overall economic benefits of the technologies
and policies that are modeled result in energy savings that equal or
exceed the cost of implementing the policies and of investing in the
technologies.
The results of two scenarios modeled in the Scenarios for a Clean
Energy Future illustrate the magnitude of benefits that could arise
from a ``no regrets'' approach:
The business-as-usual (BAU) scenario assumes that
current energy policies and programs continue, resulting in a
steady but modest pace of technological progress and improved
efficiencies.
The advanced scenario is defined by an array of
policies including a 50 percent increase in cost-shared federal
energy R&D; expanded voluntary programs; tax credits for
efficient appliances, vehicles, and non-hydro renewable
electricity; voluntary agreements to promote energy efficiency
in vehicles and industrial processes; appliance efficiency
standards; renewable portfolio standards; and a domestic carbon
cap and trading system.
The BAU scenario forecasts that U.S. energy consumption will
increase from nearly 100 quadrillion Btu (quads) in 2000 to 119 quads
in 2020. Carbon dioxide emissions are forecast to increase at a
comparable rate, from 1,346 MtC in 1990 to 1,920 MtC in 2020 (see
Figure 1).
Under the advanced scenario, the United States consumes 23 quads
(20 percent) less energy in 2020 than is predicted under the BAU
forecast. Under the advanced scenario, U.S. CO2 emissions
drop in 2020 to 1,330 MtC (31 percent), avoiding nearly 600 MtC
compared with the BAU forecast. Two-thirds of these reductions are due
to ``no regrets'' energy efficiency improvements--improvements that
shave $120 billion off the U.S. energy bill in 2020. Consistent with
the 11-Lab Study, energy intensity reductions occur quickly through
energy efficiency investments. Carbon intensity reductions are also
significant by 2020, and carbon sequestration technologies are assumed
to take hold in subsequent decades.
Evidence that Climate Change R&D Investments Can Deliver Viable
Technology Options
What evidence do we have that climate change technology R&D can
deliver products that consumers, industry, and businesses will choose
to use? Consider the results of a recent study completed in 2001 by the
National Academies as reported in Energy Research at DOE, Was It Worth
It? This study concluded that energy efficiency and fossil energy
research at DOE has produced economic net benefits:
Total net realized economic benefits associated with
selected energy efficiency programs were approximately $30
billion, substantially exceeding the roughly $7 billion in
total energy efficiency RD&D investment.
The realized economic benefits of $7.4 billion
resulting from fossil energy programs instituted from 1986 to
2000, exceeded the estimated $4.5 billion cost of the programs
during that period.
The National Academies also noted that additional environmental and
security benefits resulted, and there were significant options and
knowledge benefits.
As one example of the many successes enumerated by the National
Academies, consider the outcome of a major R&D effort that began in the
late 1970s to improve the efficiency of household refrigerators.
Between 1977 and 1982, DOE invested approximately $1.6 million in
R&D to make home refrigerators more energy efficient. Working in a
public/private partnership with compressor and appliance manufacturers,
DOE and two federal laboratories identified ways of improving the
performance of refrigerator compressors, motors, insulation, and
controls, and they provided test data for use in the setting of
national standards. These technology investments, in conjunction with
the issuance of appliance standards, cut the energy use of the average
new refrigerator in half by the year 1990 and saved U.S. consumers $7
billion in energy costs from 1981 to 1990 (1999 dollars) (see Figure
2).
In 1997, a DOE-industry cooperative R&D effort developed a
prototype ``fridge of the future'' that, again, used nearly 50 percent
less energy than refrigerators then on the market and surpassed the
2001 efficiency standard for refrigerators. These developments, in
combination with the 2001 U.S. standard, will save consumers billions
of dollars in the future.
The Non-Climate Benefits of Federal Climate Change R&D Investments
The National Academies also note in their 2001 study (Energy
Research at DOE, Was it Worth It?) that environmental and security
benefits have resulted from DOE's energy efficiency and fossil energy
research. These include cleaner air and water, which can produce
significant public health benefits, and the potential for greater fuel
flexibility, which is important to national security. In addition, the
National Academies cite the importance of options and knowledge
benefits. Options benefits are derived from technologies that are fully
developed but for which economic and policy conditions are not
currently favorable for commercialization. Knowledge benefits refer to
the contribution of R&D to the stock of engineering and scientific
information and wisdom.
Productivity improvements, product quality gains, and job creation
have been important additional collateral benefits of many energy
efficiency investments. These have been particularly significant in the
industrial sector, where energy efficiency investments have led to
greater labor productivity, better products through improved process
control, greater equipment longevity, and waste minimization. Such
productivity benefits often exceed the value of the energy saved from
the introduction of advanced efficiency technologies in industry.
Consideration of non-climate costs and benefits is important in the
design of a climate change technology portfolio, because they have a
significant impact on the likelihood of market success and the ultimate
delivery of climate benefits.
Promising Energy Efficiency Technology Opportunities
The Nation has at its disposal an underutilized reservoir of
currently cost-effective, energy-efficient technologies that can
deliver significant greenhouse gas reductions, if targeted, market-
based policies are implemented. Other energy efficiency technologies
are on the brink of cost-effectiveness, but need performance
enhancements and cost reductions to become viable.. Still other
technologies require significant science-based improvements to achieve
major technical breakthroughs necessary for technical and market
viability.
The Scenarios for a Clean Energy Future Study describes a range of
policy options for accelerating the deployment of market-ready
technologies. It also describes many of the near-term technology
opportunities that could have a significant impact by 2020, if their
performance and cost profiles can be improved. The 2003 report by DOE's
Basic Energy Sciences Advisory Committee (BESAC), Basic Research Needs
to Assure a Secure Energy Future, describes a set of research
directions that could deliver the more fundamental and necessary
breakthroughs. These directions underscore the importance of a strong
physical sciences investment to enable the technologies that provide
long-term solutions. A sampling of these research directions are listed
below:
Residential, Commercial, and Industrial Energy
Consumption
Sensors
Solid state lighting
Innovative materials for new energy technologies
Multi-layer thin film materials and deposition
processes
Transportation Energy Consumption
Integrated quantitative knowledge base for joining
of lightweight structural materials
Vehicular energy storage
Fundamental challenges in fuel cell stack materials
Integrated heterogeneous catalysis
Thermoelectric materials and energy conversion
cycles for mobile applications
Complex systems science for sustainable
transportation
Distributed Energy, Fuel Cells, and Hydrogen
Advanced hydrogen synthesis
High-capacity hydrogen storage for distribute energy
of the future
Novel membrane assemblies
Designed interfaces
Based on the BESAC report, it is clear that the technology
``pipeline'' for reducing the energy intensity of the economy can be
kept full for several decades. The energy-efficiency ``no regrets''
approach is not a short-lived phenomenon. Rather, it can take the
Nation well into the current century with climate-friendly solutions
that will allow the economy to continue to grow.
Consider some of the materials breakthroughs that are already
advancing the performance of energy technologies. Nickel aluminide
alloys, developed through a DOE-industry R&D partnership, are
extraordinarily strong, hard, and heat-resistant. Delphi Automotive
Systems in Saginaw, Michigan, recently celebrated the installation of
trays made from this new bimetallic alloy, in its steel carburizing
heat-treating furnaces. These trays are cutting energy use by five to
ten percent by making it feasible to operate furnaces at higher
temperatures and with fewer shutdowns. New steels promise similar
advantages in a wide range of other applications. Researchers at Oak
Ridge National Laboratory and Caterpillar have developed a new
stainless steel (CF8C-Plus) that is stronger and tougher at both high
and low temperatures than standard steels without costing more. Not
only the steel itself but also the method of producing it, termed
``engineered microstructures,'' are being hailed as revolutionary.
Immediate applications planned for CF8C-Plus include turbocharger
housings for heavy-duty diesel engines and industrial gas turbines,
which will allow higher temperature operations, producing significant
energy savings. Nanoscience materials research promises to produce a
stream of future breakthroughs that will offer continuing improvements
to energy technologies.
The BESAC report also enumerates promising research directions that
would reduce greenhouse gas emissions through advances in nuclear
energy and renewable energy resources, by reducing the carbon intensity
of the energy system. To meet the long-term goal of stabilizing
atmospheric concentration of carbon, breakthroughs in sequestration
technologies are also required. Finally, improved technologies are
needed for measuring and monitoring the quantities and fluxes of
greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere.
Conclusion
Energy conservation does not have the rugged, romantic appeal of
oil drilling or coal mining. It does not wow us with massive dams,
dramatic cooling towers, or tall smokestacks. But energy conservation
does make a tremendous amount of energy available, prevents pollution,
and avoids the emission of greenhouse gases. In fact, over the past 25
years, energy efficiency has become the number one domestic source of
energy available for use by U.S. consumers. Nearly a quarter of the
energy we use today is energy that would have been lost to waste
without the energy-efficiency technologies that have been developed and
implemented since the Arab oil embargo of 1973-74. In the absence of
these energy efficiency improvements, the Nation's greenhouse gas
emissions would be significantly greater.
An expanded climate change technology portfolio could significantly
accelerate the development and deployment of cost-effective, efficient,
clean energy technologies--technologies that are good for business,
good for consumers, good for the economy, and good for the environment.
To secure these benefits, the Nation needs to move forward on three
major fronts--on policies to address market imperfections, R&D to
accelerate technology advancements, and programs to facilitate
technology deployment.
Thank you for this opportunity to talk with you today. I would be
happy to answer any questions.
Biography for Marily A. Brown
Marilyn Brown is the Director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's
Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Program, a $125 million/year
program of research on advanced energy efficiency, electric
reliability, and renewable energy technologies. During her 20 years at
ORNL, she has researched the impacts of policies and programs aimed at
accelerating the development and deployment of sustainable energy
technologies. Prior to coming to Oak Ridge, she was a tenured Associate
Professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Illinois,
Urbana-Champaign. While on the faculty, she received two NSF grants and
funding from other sources to support her research on the diffusion of
energy innovations. She has a Ph.D. in geography from the Ohio State
University, where she was a University Fellow; a Master's Degree in
resource planning from the University of Massachusetts; and a BA in
political science (with a minor in mathematics) from Rutgers
University. She has authored more than 140 publications and has
received awards for her research from the American Council for an
Energy-Efficient Economy, the Association of American Geographers, the
Technology Transfer Society, and the Association of Women in Science. A
recent study that she co-led (Scenarios for a Clean Energy Future) is
the most comprehensive assessment to date of the policy and technology
opportunities available to the United States to meet its energy-related
challenges. This study was the subject of a dedicated issue of Energy
Policy and has played a significant role in international climate
change debates. Dr. Brown serves on the boards of several energy,
engineering, and environmental organizations and journals. She is also
a member of the National Commission on Energy Policy.
Discussion
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. All written testimony will
be submitted for the record. We welcome here today the
gentleman for Maryland, Mr. Gilchrest, who is not an official
Member of this subcommittee, but serves on the Science
Committee, and I would ask unanimous consent to have him
participate in this hearing. Without objection, so ordered.
Welcome, Mr. Gilchrest, and now, at this point, we will
open our first round of questions, and the Chair recognizes
herself for five minutes.
My first question is to Mr. Conover. The programs that the
Administration cites as key to its climate change technology
strategy appear to be all long-term efforts. If we wait for the
results from FutureGen, it will be at least 10 years before
results can reassure private investors that this technology is
viable, significant penetration of hydrogen will take at least
15 years or more, and the international fusion experiment,
ITER, is unlikely to lead to changes in the energy market for
at least 50 years, and how can we wait so long?
Mr. Conover. Thank you, Madam Chairman. We need to be clear
that while the Administration has announced those priorities as
part of the NCCTI process of focusing on long-term large payoff
areas, where there is a key role for federal R&D, we are not
giving up on the rest of the portfolio, which does have
significant nearer-term impacts, particularly in the area of
energy efficiency, deployment of best practices, advances in
renewables, solar, wind and geothermal, which are much further
along the commercialization path than hydrogen and FutureGen,
so we are, in fact, pursuing a diverse portfolio that has both
near and long-term impacts, and look forward to reaping the
benefits of those as we move forward.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. Not having seen the first
installment of the letter from Mr. Card, is there a priority of
some of these--of the energy efficiencies and the other short-
term solutions?
Mr. Conover. When you look at the programs that we have in
place now, the Climate VISION and Climate Leaders, in
particular, where the Administration is working with trade
associations and individual companies to achieve voluntary
reductions in greenhouse gas emissions in the near-term, the
best practices and the diffusion of commercially available
technology is really the key to achieving those nearer-term
goals.
Chairwoman Biggert. Okay. Thank you. Dr. Brown, you note
that with an aggressive set of policy and technology
initiatives, it is plausible for the country to have the same
or greater level of economic output in 2020, i.e., no net cost,
as would occur under business usual, and yet, use about the
same amount of energy as we use today. They apparently would
also produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions than we produce
today. That is a pretty remarkable statement. How much of this
improvement comes from your assumption of increased funding for
energy efficiency and renewable energy?
Dr. Brown. If the modeling assumed a doubling of the R&D
budget for all energy research that deals with climate
reduction, carbon reduction technologies, and also a variety of
market-based policies, as well as a carbon cap and trade
system, we assume would be put in place by the year 2005. The
study was done in 2000, so now, we are behind on that timeline,
and we, today, couldn't achieve that all by 2020. It is a 20-
year timeframe, though. I think within 20 years of starting an
aggressive set of programs and policies such as that, those
estimates would still hold.
Chairwoman Biggert. Are there particular areas of energy
efficiency or renewable energy research that you would
recommend receive greater emphasis?
Dr. Brown. The opportunities to reduce energy consumption
in buildings and industrial facilities, I think, are very
promising, and deserve greater focus in terms of improving
those technologies through science-based research. I think they
are just more difficult to, without strong policies, translate
the research benefits in the transportation sector into real
fuel economy savings in the marketplace. The policies are
really needed there, in combination with the research.
Chairwoman Biggert. And two thirds of the improvement comes
from what you call the no regrets.
Dr. Brown. Yes.
Chairwoman Biggert. Are there any particularly low-hanging
fruit that the Government could target for harvest? Where do we
go first?
Dr. Brown. Well, you know, that is why it is so difficult
to sell energy efficiency, because there is no silver bullet.
It is everywhere. It is your lighting, it is the building
envelope, it is the equipment that is--the space conditioning
and throughout an industrial plant, likewise, it is all of the
ways that energy is used. I do think that material science is a
fundamental research foundation to deliver many of the
advances, because if we can operate equipment at higher
temperatures, for instance, we can gain greater efficiencies,
as in microturbines, or in diesel engines, and that is an area,
I think, with great promise.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you, and my time has expired. I
recognize the gentleman from Texas for five minutes.
Mr. Lampson. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Mr. Rudins, in
the absence of compelling air quality regulations, what makes
you think that the famously risk and innovation-averse electric
utility industry will adopt such revolutionary and expensive
technology, and why are they interested in participated in
FutureGen when coal plants are still being plant and CO2
is still not considered to be a criterion pollutant?
Mr. Rudins. In fact, that is a very good question. I would
answer that question by saying that one of the concerns
utilities also have is regulatory certainty, and both for
traditional pollutants, but especially for carbon, there is
considerable regulatory uncertainty in terms of what they will
face in the future.
Over the last 30 years or so, the investment that we have
made in coal technology, clean coal technology, has led to ever
cleaner systems, but ever cleaner systems still are not
sufficient to deal with what might be on the horizon in terms
of regulatory requirements and others.
FutureGen, if it is successful in achieving its goals, is
the ultimate manifestation of clean coal technology.
Technology, from an environmental perspective, cannot go much
further than zero or near zero emission technology. If one
could successfully develop that class of technology, that, in
essence, would convey regulatory certainty and you could deal
with future environmental requirements, regulated and non-
regulated. If you can do it in a cost-competitive manner, you
in a sense have your cake and you can eat it as well.
Now, a few years ago, the utility and the coal industry may
not have embraced FutureGen as aggressively as they actually
have. You may be aware that a FutureGen alliance has formed
with the over nine member companies representing over 20
percent of the U.S.-based coal-based power generation. Over 45
percent of the U.S.-based coal production, saying we need this.
We are committed to it, and we will work with you to try and
make it happen. The National Mining Association has stepped
forward with a similar statement. So, in essence, the
electricity generation industry is stepping forward offering to
do missionary work to establish the technology base for a
future fleet of power plants and technologies that could meet
whatever environmental future we foresee.
Mr. Lampson. Well, through that process, you will capture
CO2. The intention is to reinject it and store it
some place, put it into unminable coal seams, so a question for
you, Dr. Benson. How much of that is available in this country,
but more importantly that that, let me ask this question, and I
would like for you to comment on it, but let me ask this one.
In the case of sequestration in deep saline aquifers, will
there be significant amounts of displaced or produced water,
and if so, how will be handle such large quantities of water?
Dr. Benson. You really need to look site by site, whether
or not there will be significant quantities of displaced water.
The best sites, those that are very large, such as the Frio
Formation in the Houston area, can accommodate such a
tremendous quantity of CO2 that it is unlikely there
would be produced brines, and if they did, you would be pushing
them out into the ocean, not onto the land, so it really
wouldn't be an issue there. But it is an issue, and again, you
know, geologic sequestration is not a panacea. It needs to be
done carefully with all the appropriate site characterization
and monitoring and so forth.
Mr. Lampson. These unminable coal seams, make--just one
quick comment on it. How much of that is available, and where
do you find them? Where are they?
Dr. Benson. Well, I am not an expert on the quantity of
unminable coal seams. There are, in the Rocky Mountain region,
there are a number of significant deposits. There is also some
new work by the U.S. Geological Survey showing significant
deposits in the Southeast that may be amenable to this kind of
technology as well. That is some of the work that needs to be
done to characterize just how much and where this could be
accomplished.
Mr. Lampson. Dr. Brown, in H.R. 238, this Committee
authorized the construction of a network of regional advanced
energy technology transfer centers to bridge the gap between
development of energy-efficient technologies and full-scale
commercialization, and this provision has been included in the
draft Research and Development Title of the Energy Bill, H.R.
6. Are you aware of this provision, and if so, how do you think
initiatives such as this would fit into a national climate
change initiative?
Dr. Brown. I have to confess I am not familiar with that
initiative, but I want to learn more, because it sounds like it
is very promising and would help to bridge that gap between
science and marketplace improvement, so it sounds like an
excellent way to proceed.
Mr. Lampson. Thank you very much. My time is up.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. The gentleman from Georgia,
Mr. Gingrey, is recognized for five minutes.
Mr. Gingrey. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Mr. Rudins, in her
testimony, Dr. Benson indicated a cost range of $3 to $10 per
ton for carbon disposal, not including the cost of carbon
capture. This is certainly in the range of the Department of
Energy goals. What are the costs of CO2 capture, and
how soon do you see DOE's goals being reached?
Mr. Rudins. The greater cost component, in fact, is the
capture component. Today's technology, if you were to employ it
such as a means coverage with existing power plants, would be
very costly indeed, much more so than just the disposal costs.
But already, technologies that are coming out of the
laboratory, like the clathrate process, to name one, offers the
potential, when integrated with advanced systems, such as IGCC,
to reduce that cost by perhaps an order of magnitude, as well
as the energy costs associated with it.
The goal that we have for the Department sequestration
program is to get the costs to $10 a ton carbon, and that is
capture and disposal. The current price point in terms of
laboratory technology, like the clathrate process, is still at
the laboratory stage is in the $30 or so range.
Mr. Gingrey. Mr. Conover, this question is for you. Given
the long time horizons of carbon sequestration and hydrogen
technologies, what does the Administration plan to do to meet
its near-term goal of reducing the carbon intensity of the
economy by 18 percent by the year 2012?
Mr. Conover. Thank you, Congressman. Again, this goes back
to the voluntary partnerships that the Administration is
forging through Climate VISION and Climate Leaders,
particularly focused in on areas of energy efficiency, the
buildings and industrial technologies that Dr. Brown mentioned,
further advances in solar, wind and geothermal, all of which
are still robustly funded in the Administration's budget.
Mr. Gingrey. And the Administration has stated that it
supports stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the
atmosphere. By what date will your technology efforts be able
to achieve this goal at current rates of funding?
Mr. Conover. Well, the issue of timing on the stabilization
goal is an important one. Our philosophy is moving forward
aggressively on investments in technology with both long and
near-term impacts, and as the scientific certainty advances
with respect to both what the levels need to be and how quickly
we need to achieve them, our mission is to provide a diverse
portfolio of technology that allows policymakers to respond to
that information as it becomes clearer.
Mr. Gingrey. And I would like to ask Mr. Rudins on this
one. Several experts have told us that a full-scale single site
sequestration experiment without a power plant would cost about
$50 million over 10 years, including the purchase of
CO2. Your testimony includes a cost estimate
sequestration that is over four times this number at $224
million. Can you explain how that your number was reached?
Mr. Rudins. I can't comment comparatively, because I
haven't seen the $50, $50 million estimate, but the cost that
you see incorporated in FutureGen involves extensive
instrumentation of the site, development of the site and
extensive monitoring for at least 10 years and beyond, so I
don't know if it's an apples to apples comparison. It also
allows for innovation, new technology development. It allows,
within that cost, enhanced modeling and research support
activities, so it is not just go to the site, dig a hole, or
drill a hole and pump CO2 in there. It is
essentially a full-scope research project in addition to that.
But I couldn't comment specifically without seeing the
estimates you are talking about.
Mr. Gingrey. I yield back my time at this point, Madam
Chairman.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. The Chair now recognizes the
gentlewoman from California, Ms. Woolsey.
Ms. Woolsey. Thank you, Madam Chairman--Chairwoman. I would
like to each of you, from your vantage point in what you know
so much about--you are great input for all of us, you are just
a great resource. But you come from different places, each one
of you. What do you, from your vantage point, consider to be
the one most serious threat to our climate, and will voluntary
compliance meet the needs and come up with the right solutions
soon enough? So why don't we start with you, Mr. Conover.
Mr. Conover. Thank you, Congresswoman.
Ms. Woolsey. And I know there is no one, but you tell me
your one that you think is the most important.
Mr. Conover. Well, the issue is that--the real issue is
achieving the goal of long-term stabilization at levels below
which dangerous interference with the climate will not occur.
That is the goal. The question is how does that translate into
atmospheric concentrations and over what timeframe? So the most
important thing we can be doing here is ensuring that we have a
sufficient array of technologies, both in the near and the
longer-term, that as our investment portfolio moves forward,
technologies succeed and fail based on a variety of conditions,
we are able to be flexible and respond appropriately as time
moves forward. It is not just a voluntary approach. It is a
voluntary approach coupled with significant federal R&D
investment, and we believe that is the best way to address this
challenge.
Ms. Woolsey. Mr. Rudins.
Mr. Rudins. Let me respond to you in the context of the
FutureGen technology and the project, and your thought on
voluntary compliance. The logic behind the FutureGen project is
if one can develop the technology that not only deals with
carbon emissions and traditional emissions and boosts the
performance of that technology, but does so in a cost-
competitive fashion, meaning the costs of electricity we are
projecting is no more than a 10 percent growth in the cost of
electricity, and if we are successful, perhaps at no growth in
the cost of electricity.
If that kind of technology is developed, it would be
rational that the industry would opt for deploying a cleaner
technology that is at or close to the same price point than a
less clean technology. So FutureGen does have the potential for
being a highly desirable technology with--and without any
mandatory controls as a requirement.
Ms. Woolsey. Dr. Benson.
Dr. Benson. So, first to address your questions bout the
biggest concerns regarding climate change. A number of studies
have been done recently which suggest that sea level rise would
be amongst the first things to be concerned about, and second,
a broad issue than climate change alone, but some recent
studies suggest that acidification of the surface ocean is
already taking place today, and that can potentially impact the
ocean food chain, starting with the most productive area of the
region, so those are the kinds of concerns.
With regard to voluntary compliance, I am no expert on
this, but in the circles that I spent my time, largely with the
oil and gas industry, there is certainly the feeling that
voluntary compliance, at least in the short-term, will not be
enough to motivate them in most cases.
Ms. Woolsey. Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown. Yes, I guess that in terms of the impacts of
climate change, in addition to the global warming impact, sea
rise level, et cetera, I would be concerned about the increase
in extreme weather events, more droughts and more floods, not
the net impact, but the extremity of the impacts. And I guess I
think you asked what might be a high priority for action. I
would like to offer that I believe the Federal Government needs
to lead by example in a stronger way. We do do some of that, of
course, but--and not just the Federal Government, but State and
local government as well, so show the steps that can be taken
to address, reduce greenhouse gas emissions cost-effectively.
Ms. Woolsey. Thank you. Mr. Conover, when you talk about
the goal of the Federal Government, long-term stabilization, I
never hear anything about when and at what levels, so what
stabilization levels for CO2 parts per million would
be the aim for the Federal Government and when?
Mr. Conover. Well, thank you for that. That is the issue of
a flexible portfolio that employs a diverse set of
technologies, because we don't have a specific target. We don't
know exactly when we need to hit that target, but we need to be
taking action now. As the scientific uncertainty decreases and
we get better information moving forward, making these
investments today positions us better for the future to address
those problems as they become more clear.
Ms. Woolsey. Well, thank you very much. I have to say I
think the future is here, and that doesn't make me feel very
confident. I think we are behind the gun on all of this, and we
had better be boogying, or we are going to be in big trouble.
So, thank you, my time is up.
Chairwoman Biggert. The gentlelady's time has expired. The
gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Ehlers, is recognized for five
minutes.
Mr. Ehlers. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have a host of
questions, far more than I can do in five minutes, so I hope
there is a second round while I am still here. The first
question, to Conover or Rudins, I am not sure which one would
be best. What sort of energy penalty are you looking at for
separating, compressing and injecting the CO2, and
Mr. Rudins, you just mentioned 10 percent increase. Where do
you get that figure? It seems to me that it is going to be a
lot more than that, unless you are going to locate your power
plants right on top of the coal field and inject right back in.
Mr. Rudins. My 10 percent figure was in terms of cost of
electricity. You asked about the energy penalty.
Mr. Ehlers. Right.
Mr. Rudins. If you were to take an amine scrubber and add
it to an existing coal plant, the energy penalty is probably on
the order of 30 percent of the gross power output of the plant.
If you were to take a technology like the clathrate technology
that I described, that works effectively, most effectively with
a high CO2 concentration stream of the type that you
would get, say, from oxygen blown gasification, which would
have about a 90 percent CO2 component, there the
energy penalty by the developer is estimated to be in the five
to eight percentage point range, as opposed to the 30 or more
percent point for a traditional amine scrubber, and the
developers are continuing to try to bring that energy penalty
further down. But in terms of the costs of electricity
differential, when we are talking about FutureGen, it is the
power plant plus sequestration costs, so there are
opportunities for driving down the cost of the power plant, the
cost of the electricity generation.
Recognize that we are also talking about co-producing
hydrogen, so there are a number of revenue streams that are
part of that equation when I make that estimate of a 10 percent
at most cost of electricity penalty.
Mr. Ehlers. And how do you propose to produce hydrogen?
Mr. Rudins. In this particular concept, we would gasify gas
through an oxygen blown-gasifier, or gasify coal, I should say,
then go through a shift reactor to maximize the hydrogen
content, then take the hydrogen plus CO2 gas stream
and separate it out, separate out the CO2 through
processes like the clathrate process or membrane technology,
and then use the hydrogen to power a fuel cell or hydrogen
turbine, and then sequester the CO2 stream.
Mr. Ehlers. So would this be a combined generation plant,
then?
Mr. Rudins. It would be.
Mr. Ehlers. So you can electrical energy from the
combustion of the carbon, and you subtract--and you generate
electrical energy through the fuel cell, using the hydrogen.
Mr. Rudins. There are two possible configurations, one
using the carbon, the other is just going all the way to
hydrogen and using the hydrogen in the turbine, rather than
combusting the carbon, so there are several possible
configurations there.
Mr. Ehlers. But the expense of operating a plant like that
is much greater than the normal coal-fired plant, isn't it?
Mr. Rudins. That is mainly because of the--new technology
always costs more than mature, established technology. Today,
gasification based systems have an initial capital cost about
20 percent higher than a traditional coal plant, but that price
point differential is coming up, and future plants will be more
efficient, so while there may be--while higher capital costs
may remain, the cost of electricity, through efficiency
improvements, would come down.
Mr. Ehlers. Let me just say I am skeptical about the
processes you have described. I find difficult to believe that
you would be able to get the price down that much. I would
guess it is probably a 30 percent penalty in either one. But
let me pose the next question, then. If that is true, what
happens to the competitiveness between nuclear power and coal
power?
Mr. Rudins. I am not sure how to answer that question,
because you essentially have to postulate a future scenario,
and----
Mr. Ehlers. That is what you have just been doing.
Mr. Rudins. Well, but a future scenario, in terms of is
there valuation for the carbon or not. If you were to look at
today's coal-based prices and add 10 percent to it, I am not
sure where the price point is for nuclear. You may have that
knowledge. I don't off the top of my head.
Mr. Ehlers. I don't. Does anyone here have that knowledge?
Most of you are from the Department of Energy. Well, I am just
curious. Obviously, France and India have decided it is cheaper
to produce electricity using nuclear power instead of fossil
fuel, so the price differential can't be that much at this
point.
Mr. Conover. Right, and that is the thrust of several of
the Administration's programs on the nuclear power side. Our
belief is that you are going to need, looking out over the next
century, in order to provide clean energy, you are going to
need all of these options, nuclear and sequestered fossil fuel.
Mr. Ehlers. And in terms of transportation-produced
CO2, are you assuming that is all going to be
hydrogen fuel cell driven?
Mr. Rudins. I am--did you say transportation-produced
CO2? In that particular scenario, with FutureGen,
the first line of attack is to deal with the CO2
emissions with power plants. The co-production of hydrogen
would in fact allow hydrogen to also be available for the
transportation fleet, yes, in that particular scenario.
Mr. Ehlers. Yeah. The question again is, at what cost
compared to alternative methods of production?
Mr. Rudins. Well, currently, the projection for FutureGen,
or I should say, the goal, is to produce hydrogen at
approximately $4 a million BTU or less. The present commercial
price point for hydrogen is the price of natural gas plus about
$2, give or take.
Mr. Ehlers. I believe my time has expired. Thank you.
Chairwoman Biggert. The gentleman is correct. The gentleman
from Illinois, Mr. Costello, is recognized for five minutes.
Mr. Costello. Madam Chair, thank you very much, and I thank
you and Mr. Lampson for calling this hearing today. Mr. Rudins,
as you know, we have a very deep interest in the state of
Illinois in FutureGen. We met earlier this year with the
Assistant Secretary, Mr. Smith, talked about it and Dr. Miller
traveled to Southern Illinois University in Carbondale back in
July, where myself and my colleague, Congressman Shimkus, as
well as our Senators and the Governor, sponsored a forum where
we brought industry and government together to talk about
FutureGen, and as you know, we believe that we have all of the
natural resources to make FutureGen a success in the state of
Illinois. Since I have limited time and I have several
questions, let me get directly into questions.
One is I wonder if you might lay out for the Subcommittee
where we are as far as the process is concerned. As far as
criteria, site selection, naming the consortium, preliminary
environmental studies and all of those types of things.
Mr. Rudins. We are presently at very early stages. We are
now going through an internal departmental process called the
CD0 process, to in fact enable us to then formally move
forward. You may recall there was an RFI, request for
information, that was issued that laid out an approach the
Department proposed, including negotiating with a qualifying
industry consortium to move forward.
Before we can get to that point, we have to go through our
internal process, which I anticipate probably will take us
through this calendar year, maybe into the next calendar year,
at which point, then, we need to make a decision as to whether
we are going to go forward in an--initially, a noncompetitive
approach in terms of negotiating with the industry consortium,
as the RFI laid out, or whether we would do that competitively.
In all cases, ultimately, the procurement of the components
for FutureGen and the site will all be done competitively, and
will be part of a formal, transparent, competitive process. But
once we complete that step, then we would enter into either
negotiations with a qualifying consortium or we would initiate
a competitive procurement that would lead to selection of a
qualifying consortium. That is about a one-year differential
there, whether we do it noncompetitively or competitively.
After we initiate negotiations with a qualifying
consortium, that would likely be a very complex cooperative
agreement to negotiate in dealing with the various facets of
such a project. It could take four to six months to negotiate
such a cooperative agreement, after which the first priority
would be to develop the key criteria, technical criteria for
site selection that would then be the basis of a competitive
procurement, but as I laid out that approximate timeline, you
can see it is--we have got quite a bit of work to do before we
are to the point of initiating site selection. I don't know if
that fully answers your question.
Mr. Costello. Well, if you--do you have a timeline chart,
in other words, do you have a goal in mind as to when the
negotiations will take place, and hopefully, a consortium will
be named?
Mr. Rudins. We basically have two timelines, one is if we
go the noncompetitive route, and the other adds a year if one
goes competitively.
Mr. Costello. And when will you make that decision, when
will the Department make the decision if it is going to be
competitive or if it is going to be noncompetitive?
Mr. Rudins. Hopefully before the end of this calendar year.
Mr. Costello. But at the end of this year, we will know if
you are going competitive or noncompetitive.
Mr. Rudins. That is correct.
Mr. Costello. How long do you expect that it will take to--
assuming that you go noncompetitive, how long will it take to
negotiate? What would you anticipate?
Mr. Rudins. Well, recognize that at this point in time, it
is simply my best estimate, but I would say four to six months.
Mr. Costello. So sometime in the summer or fall, let us say
the summer of 2004, you will have a consortium in place and you
will then be able to proceed to evaluating sites?
Mr. Rudins. Well, the first step will be--and we are doing
all of this in parallel, developing the key technical criteria
that would be needed for doing that. We expect to have it as a
very open and transparent process and--much like we have done
in former competitive stations, we could very well have one or
more public meetings to talk about the criteria that have been
developed and the process that we are proposing to pursue for
that competitive selection.
Mr. Costello. And the last question, and I know that the
Administration and the Department of Energy has estimated that
it will cost about $1.1 billion, this FutureGen prototype
plant, and I understand that the goal is about 50 percent
private investment, 50 percent federal. I don't know if that
has been determined yet, but let me just ask you where are we
in the funding process? Has the Department of Energy, the
Administration, requested funds? I know that there is $9
million provided in the Interior Appropriations Bill for
FutureGen, but are there other appropriations that you have
requested?
Mr. Rudins. Yes, a couple of questions. First, we have not
yet made a final determination on funding. You are aware we
just received some funding guidance in the '04 Appropriation
Bill that we are now reviewing. That guidance indicated the
appropriateness of less than 50 percent cost-sharing, 80/20 for
research, prototype kind of components, and 50 percent cost-
sharing for demonstration components, so we are still working
through that in terms of making a final determination with
regard to that.
With, and I forgot the other part of your question, sir.
Mr. Costello. Have you requested additional funds other
than the $9 million in the Interior Appropriations Bill?
Mr. Rudins. No, just the $9 million. We did request
authorization to use prior year Clean Coal funds, prior--Clean
Coal funds appropriated in prior years, and in the '04
Appropriation Bill, we received authorization, or in effect,
appropriation of $9 billion in response to that request, which
is the sum of money that we need for the first year.
Mr. Costello. And how much is that the first year?
Mr. Rudins. $9 million, the DOE share, for the first year.
Mr. Costello. Madam Chair, thank you. I thank you, Mr.
Rudins.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you, Mr. Costello. The gentleman
from Maryland is recognized for five minutes.
Mr. Gilchrest. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I have a few
questions, so I apologize for asking you for a quick response,
so you can answer yes, no, or maybe to most of these questions.
I just want to get a sense of how you feel. Based on the
evidence that our climate is changing, I guess people have some
evidence that the climate is changing. There is not too many
people who still think that we are okay.
Do you feel that our policies are sufficient to mitigate
the full range of the potential consequences of climate change,
if we look at weather patterns, more rain, less rain, the
potential significant biological consequences, the disease
consequences, sea level rise, acidification of sea level
surface, et cetera, et cetera. Do you think our policies right
now, and you probably already looked at this, and I was just
showing it to Vern, but this week's Science Times and New York
Times is mostly about climate change, and they have some
really--and I know you can't learn everything you need to know
in one article, but there has been articles like this and books
written over the past decades about the potential consequences.
One of the things I read in this article was that the
Amazon jungle might be an exporter of CO2, not a
sink, as a result of a number of different variables that are
going on down there, so have we taken the full range of
consequences into consideration? Do we have, the Administration
in particular, a sense of urgency about what is going on with
the fragile biosphere as a result of human activity? Do we
need, you might want to answer more than just yes, no, maybe on
this, because I am going to--do we need a Manhattan Project? We
are going to unload, this afternoon, $87 billion on Iraq. I
voted for it. I am in support of what we are trying to do
there, that is $87 billion. Are our policies right now
sufficient enough to meet the consequences of the climate
change? Do we need a Manhattan Project? Is there a sense of
urgency about this, and is there a need for a sense of urgency?
Mr. Conover. Well, I am not sure, Congressman, what the--
what a Manhattan Project in today's dollars would equate to,
but this Administration is very proud of $1.6 billion
investment in climate change related technologies. The really
groundbreaking and leapfrog technologies, initiatives like the
Hydrogen Fuel Initiative, ITER, FutureGen, we are putting the
pieces on the table and making the investments to----
Mr. Gilchrest. Right. I apologize because I may not be
around for the next round of questions, and I know everything
that you are doing, and I have heard Vern discuss the hydrogen,
coal sequestration, those kinds of things, and I have had
meetings with the Department of Energy about this issues, and
the particulars and the details of them. I think the overall
riding sense that I would like to leave here with is we are
okay, we are on the right track.
Mr. Conover. We believe we are on the right track and
making the investments we need to make today to be prepared to
respond to the science as it answers these questions about the
consequences. I think it is important to note that one area
where there is great scientific uncertainty are the
consequences of climate change in the long-term, but our focus
is on mitigation technologies, not adapting to those
consequences, but mitigating greenhouse gas emissions into the
atmosphere.
Mr. Gilchrest. Thank you.
Mr. Rudins. I have to respond to you in the context of my
responsibility in the FutureGen. I can't imagine a more
aggressive goal than the development of coal-based power
generation technology with zero emissions. To me, it is the
ultimate manifestation of clean coal technology, and if we are
successful in achieving that, it will be a remarkable
achievement in that you can continue to use fossil fuels with
zero emission, and more so if we are successful with our
economic targets, to do so at competitive electricity prices.
Mr. Gilchrest. Thank you. Can you sequester CO2
without it leaking? That would be for Dr. Benson.
Dr. Benson. Yes, you can.
Mr. Gilchrest. Okay. Can we sequester more CO2
than we are producing so we have a net reduction in
CO2?
Dr. Benson. Yes, we can.
Mr. Gilchrest. Okay. Good. But for how long, Vern says.
Probably for our lifetime, anyway. Now, we want it for
thousands of years.
Dr. Benson. Yes.
Mr. Gilchrest. Good.
Dr. Benson. Thousands of years.
Mr. Gilchrest. Okay. Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown. Yes, I guess I would like to draw to your
attention that I do not believe we have an adequate program in
the area of climate adaptation. In some instances, it may be
more cost-effective for us to figure out how we can protect
ourselves against the consequences of climate change, in
combination with, of course, trying to invest in carbon
mitigation efforts. So I would just offer----
Mr. Gilchrest. Do we need a two-track policy?
Dr. Brown. We do.
Mr. Gilchrest. Mitigation and adaptation.
Dr. Brown. Adaptation.
Mr. Gilchrest. Because we may have crossed the line as far
as----
Dr. Brown. We may need both.
Mr. Gilchrest. Yeah.
Dr. Brown. In the end. Both offer solutions. And also, I
believe we need to invest more in assisting the developing
world, help them to develop along a pathway which is less
carbon intensive, and we could use more resources to do that,
and the benefits to the Nation would include export
opportunities for our clean technologies.
Mr. Gilchrest. Maybe we should eliminate the space program
for a decade. What do you think about that?
Dr. Brown. No, I wouldn't. No.
Mr. Gilchrest. Just kidding. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. The gentleman from Oregon,
Mr. Wu.
Mr. Wu. Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to take a step
back. I realize that you all are implementing policy,
developing policy, but I would like to ask you the same
question that I have been asking meteorologists and atmospheric
scientists for 10 or 15 years, and that is just first of all to
go down the row, one way or the other, just take a step back
and--what's--what probability, 0.30, 0.50, 0.80, higher or
lower, would you assign, based on the evidence that we
currently have available, I guess, there are some Members of
the Full Committee who continue to have serious doubts about
whether there is a real phenomena of atmospheric or climate
change because of greenhouse gases, so I would just like to go
down the row, and I have to say that over a period of time, I
have been getting, it seems, like a steady change in
probabilistic assessments from meteorologists and so on, and I
would like to hear from you all, first your assignment of
probabilities that there is an effect currently occurring.
Either direction.
Mr. Conover. Well, I will start by saying the beauty of
being the Director of the Climate Change Technology Program and
not the Climate Change Science Program is I don't have to
answer that question. I know----
Mr. Wu. I would like to know what the implementer things
about--whether the implementer believes there is a real problem
or not. I think that is highly relevant.
Mr. Conover. We have our eye on the goal, sir, yes, and we
are charged with facilitating the development and deployment of
these technologies.
Mr. Wu. But what I asked for is a number.
Mr. Conover. I am not qualified to give you that number,
sir.
Mr. Rudins. Unfortunately, I have to give you a similar
answer. I am not really qualified to give you that number, but
to respond to you in the fashion that again, with the
development of the--of FutureGen, that question perhaps doesn't
even need to be answered in the context of fossil fuels. If
that technology is, again, developed and available for
deployment, a zero emission technology, then whatever the
predicted future is, that will be one possible solution path
for dealing with it.
Dr. Benson. Unfortunately, I am not a meteorologist and an
expert in that topic, so I can't give you a probability. I
will, however, say I think that we should work as aggressively
and as quickly as possible to develop a suite of mitigation
options, so that we are prepared to implement them both in the
short, medium and long-term.
Mr. Wu. Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown. Yes, I would refer to the conclusion of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which said something
like the body of the evidence is overwhelming, my probability
would be very high.
Mr. Wu. So, Dr. Brown, you have a very high probability,
and as for Dr. Benson and Mr. Rudin's and Mr. Conover, would it
be fair to say that whatever probability you all might assign
to it, that you view this as--you are completely motivated to
work on mitigation or solutions?
Mr. Conover. Absolutely, sir.
Mr. Wu. And perhaps, Dr. Brown, since you are the only
person who was willing to take a stab at the number, I read an
article a long time ago, I can't remember whether it was in
Nature or Science, but it said that climate change may be
paradoxical, that is, we get these greenhouse gases, we get
some temperature rise, but instead of steady creep in
temperature, we may flip right into an Ice Age instead. I
haven't been able to track that. If you know anything about
that, I am dying to know whether it is going to get warmer or
colder.
Dr. Brown. I will get back with you. That is the best
answer.
Mr. Wu. Thank you.
Mr. Gilchrest. Would the gentleman yield?
Mr. Wu. Yes, I would.
Mr. Gilchrest. Mr. Wu, there is some fascinating evidence
about the global warming causing the slowdown or the stop of
the ocean currents, the conveyor belt which drives that, and if
that happens, that could trigger an Ice Age, because you don't
have the dispersal of warm air from the equator getting up to
the more northern regions around the Arctic Circle, and it is a
little bit complicated, but there is a potential to trigger an
Ice Age within less than 20 years, so----
Mr. Wu. I thank the gentleman from Maryland, and I have
also read about how precipitation could cause reflectivity to
change, and that could be another effect, but the gentleman has
me at a disadvantage. He has the Tuesday Science section from
the New York Times, and I am afraid that that is probably as
technical as I can get these days, so if the gentleman wouldn't
mind loaning it to me at some point, I surely will appreciate
it, and with that, Madam Chair, I am pleased to yield back the
balance of my time.
Chairwoman Biggert. The gentleman from----
Mr. Lampson. I want to butt in----
Chairwoman Biggert [continuing]. Texas.
Mr. Lampson [continuing]. For a second, and ask Mr.
Gilchrest also. Remember when we were in--at the South Pole, we
were told something about those huge icebergs----
Mr. Gilchrest. Yes.
Mr. Lampson [continuing]. That were blocking, I forgot what
it was.
Mr. Gilchrest. The Ross Sea.
Mr. Lampson. The Ross Sea, that actually could potentially
change the climate of the Earth, or the temperature of those
flows of water through the oceans.
Mr. Gilchrest. We saw a regional climate change right down
there in the Antarctic, in that region around McMurdo Sound,
when this--two huge icebergs closed off the outlet of the Ross
Sea----
Mr. Lampson. Right.
Mr. Gilchrest [continuing]. To that southern part of the
Pacific Ocean. When it did that, the frozen Ross Sea could not
get out any more, so even though global warming caused those
icebergs to break off, the region around McMurdo Sound became
much colder, because the ice couldn't be pushed out by the
wind, and therefore, that precipitated another mini regional
climate change, but made it colder. There is a great trend----
Chairwoman Biggert. Maybe at our next hearing, we will have
to include icebergs. I have a couple of more questions, so
maybe all of our Members don't, but I would like to proceed.
Mr. Conover, in the report that was delivered this morning, the
Department notes that there--well, less than 10 technologies,
10 or less, I don't know what that means, submitted that were
rated high in technical merit, responsive to the criteria.
These were reports that were in response to the request for
information, so they came from various places, and yet, were
either novel or created but kind of fell through the current
DOE programs, so were ineligible for funding. Do you know what
some of these technologies are, and how DOE might help to
ensure that these ideas perhaps will become commercialized.
Mr. Conover. Thank you, Chairwoman Biggert, and let me put
that in context. The RFI that you are discussing and the report
that we are providing today, was sent out in November of 2002,
and closed in January of this year. It was asking for
innovative approaches to climate change technology, and the
intent was to try to determine whether there were concepts out
there that were not being addressed by the existing procurement
programs or would be unable to be addressed by the existing
procurement programs, that RFI garnered about 180 different
concepts proposed by 79 different entities.
All of those entities, in proposing those concepts, have an
expectation of privacy with respect to their specific ideas,
but I can say that because we are--we were able to move forward
on one of the areas that is an extremely important, novel, sort
of applied strategic research idea, and that is microbes that
could potentially both produce hydrogen and sequester carbon
dioxide. The outcome of the analysis that is discussed in that
report was that the DOE Office of Science is able to modify its
procurement programs and begin to incorporate that kind of
program into its efforts, so while we were looking for gaps,
what we were able to do as well was help the programs fine-tune
their procurements so that they can gather in concepts such as
that in the future.
Chairwoman Biggert. So, the Department will continue to
monitor those programs and perhaps at some point, more of them
will fit into something that can be used.
Mr. Conover. Yes, we have requested funding for a
competitive solicitation program that would have followed on to
the request for information. Haven't received funding from
Congress on that yet. If we remain unsuccessful in getting
funding for an actual procurement program along those lines, we
may continue the request for information process to continue to
survey the community and ensure that these concepts are brought
forward and incorporated into the existing programs.
Chairwoman Biggert. Well, it makes it easier for Congress
to fund something that they know what it is, I suppose. Dr.
Benson, are candidate sites for geologic sequestration located
throughout North America? Are there areas of North America that
don't have any candidate sites?
Dr. Benson. The majority of areas with large concentrations
of CO2 sources are located within close proximity to
potential storage sites. If you look at the Northwest, the
rocks that underlay that area may or may not be suitable. There
are some studies that are being done by Batel to look at
whether those kind of formations would be acceptable, too, but
at this point, we don't know. But by and large, yes, there are
reasonably close storage sites.
Chairwoman Biggert. Okay. What is the minimum number of
sites that need to be tested to convince the scientific
community that carbon sequestration is a viable technology?
Dr. Benson. I think that demonstration projects, or you
know, large scale pilots in about five different regions, I
think something in the Gulf Coast area, something in the
Southeast, something in the Midwest with the Mount Simon
Formation and something in the West with the Central Valley of
California would go a long, long way toward persuading
scientists that this was a good strategy to pursue.
Chairwoman Biggert. And how long do you think this will
take?
Dr. Benson. I think a program, aggressively implemented
now, I think that within 10 years or so, we could have a very
good idea of whether there would be good sites and what the
capacity would be in those regions.
Chairwoman Biggert. Would you agree with that, Mr. Rudins?
Mr. Rudins. Yes, I would.
Chairwoman Biggert. Mr. Lampson, would you?
Mr. Lampson. No more questions, but just a wrap-up comment,
it is hard to consider all of these things and fit it into
context with what we are living. Mr. Gilchrest made the comment
that we are providing $87 billion in Iraq right now, and I,
too, voted for that. Yet we put that in the context of spending
a billion dollars on research on something that has in its
hands, the future of this whole Earth, and it gets a little
frightening, where we are placing our priorities, where we puts
tens or hundreds of billions of dollars into defense-related
matters, yet we are more or less turning our backs on something
that could consume each human being on this planet. We,
perhaps, need to give that consideration, and perhaps coin the
phrase that Ms. Woolsey used a while ago, maybe it is time for
us to boogey.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you for your comments. The
gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Gingrey.
Mr. Gingrey. Well, first of all, in response, maybe to
follow up to what Mr. Lampson said, in comparing the cost and
the priorities, I think those terrorists could kill us dead a
whole lot quicker than some of these greenhouse gas effects, so
maybe that is a part of it.
Mr. Lampson. But not the whole Earth.
Mr. Gingrey. My question, is guess, is to Dr. Benson. In
regard to the CO2 sequestration, I guess that seems
to be the main focus of the hearing, and, you know, I realize
that, you know, CO2, you put it down deep, and it is
soluble in water, and a lot of the CO2 would
dissolve, but I wanted to ask you in regard to sites of
sequestration where you are putting literally tons and tons of
CO2, however deep it might be, under the Earth's
surface, there is a certain amount of pressure that would
develop even with the solubility of CO2 in water,
and would you have to worry a long-term about a site where
there is a fault, a significant fault, as an example, in
California, is there some potential at some point in time that
we will push, we will make an island out of California if we
were sequestering CO2 in an area like that?
Dr. Benson. Well, it turns out that faults often provide
seals to oil and gas reservoirs, so just by virtue of existence
of the presence of a fault does not mean that a site would not
be a good storage site. In fact, you know, many of the best
traps are located where you have a fracture and the sand get
butted up against shale on the other side. So, you know,
certainly, if you have a site that there is a fault there, you
would want to characterize that that fault seals, rather than
is open and leaks, and there are tests available today that are
very applicable and useful for testing, those kind of things.
So, you know, certainly, if there were an open fault, you know,
that would need to be considered very carefully before you
would store CO2 there, but just because there is a
fault doesn't mean you shouldn't do it.
Mr. Gingrey. Anybody else wish to comment on that? Dr.
Brown? No? Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Chairwoman Biggert. The gentleman from Oregon, Mr. Wu. All
right. Thank you. Just one last question, which is always
tricky, because it usually is the one that is the hardest. Dr.
Brown, how can the Federal Government act to eliminate the
market failures that impede deployment of energy efficiency
technologies?
Dr. Brown. Well, first, I guess, the--we have got to get
the prices. There are a number of externalities that are not
incorporated into the price that we currently pay for energy,
and that includes, of course, the criteria pollutants, but
also, if you wanted a price for CO2, a price for
national security, all of those, if included, would result in a
price of energy which would far exceed what we currently pay.
That is a market failure. There are other market failures. One
that I use as an example often is the principal agent failure.
That is the case where decisions are being made by one
individual that affect the energy technologies that are going
to be used by another individual. An example is the landlord
and the tenant, or the individual who purchases the fleet of
automobiles for a state agency, for those users to utilize, so
you have principal agents, and the failures are numerous, but
those are just two of them.
Chairwoman Biggert. Do you have any idea which changes
would make the greatest contribution to energy saving?
Dr. Brown. I think getting the price right. A lot of----
Chairwoman Biggert. The price is right, isn't that----
Dr. Brown. Yeah. Right. There are many ways that that can
be done, but I would put that at the top of my list.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. All right, again for Dr.
Brown. What portion of your report's recommendations have been
implemented?
Dr. Brown. Now, what is the status of the Energy Bill
today?
Chairwoman Biggert. Very close, it is very close.
Dr. Brown. Not many yet, but we are hopeful that some will
have some sticking power and maybe be implemented.
Chairwoman Biggert. Thank you. Before we bring this--the
hearing to a close, I want to thank our panelists for
testifying before the Subcommittee today. If there is no
objection, the record will remain open for additional
statements from the Members and for answers to any followup
questions the Subcommittee may ask the panelists. Without
objection, so ordered. The hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:40 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
Appendix 1:
----------
Additional Material for the Record
Report on Responses to the Request for Information Regarding the
National Climate Change Technology Initiative
U.S. Department of Energy
On November 19, 2002, a ``Request for Information and Statement of
Interest'' (RFI) was issued by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to
explore the depth and breadth of interest in a potential future
competitive solicitation for research on innovative climate change
technologies. This RFI was issued in support of the President's
National Climate Change Technology Initiative (NCCTI). The RFI closed
on January 31, 2003.
In brief, the RFI analysis revealed two benefits. First, the RFI
process provided a valuable tool in evaluating and possibly expanding
current agency R&D programs. It is possible that future RFIs can
provide further ideas for improvements to existing programs. Second,
the analysis revealed significant interest in participating in a NCCTI
competitive solicitation program. At the same time, the RFI submittals
raised a number procedural issues that will need to be addressed and
resolved if an RFP is pursued. Better awareness of these issues can be
expected to clarify and strengthen a future NCCTI competitive
solicitation program.
Request for Information
As announced in the RFI, as in reference to the NCCTI, the DOE
requested information on and expressions of potential interest in a
possible, future DOE competitive solicitation on research. If pursued,
the research would explore concepts, technologies and technical
approaches that could, if successful, contribute in significant ways
to: (a) future reductions in or avoidances of greenhouse gas emissions;
(b) greenhouse gas capture and sequestration (permanent storage); (c)
capture and conversion of greenhouse gases to beneficial use; or (d)
enhanced monitoring and measurement of greenhouse gas emissions,
inventories and fluxes in a variety of settings.
The RFI mentioned that, if pursued, the NCCTI competitive
solicitation could involve the award of tens of millions of dollars in
research grants or other forms of financial assistance for research
over multiple years. The RFI said that, if pursued, the competitive
solicitation would be open to all proposers in order to encourage the
broadest possible participation.
As a first step in considering this program, the DOE invited
interested parties to submit a Statement of Interest, which would
include identification of a point of contact and other information
about the party. Parties were also encouraged to submit a brief outline
of an idea, concept, technology or technical approach, that would be
the subject of research and focus on the above-stated NCCTI objectives.
Summary of Responses
DOE received 180 responses containing at least one proposed idea,
concept, technology or technical approach, from a total of 79 different
individuals, organizations or other entities. DOE received an
additional 16 statements of interest, but with no submitted ideas. A
summary of the RFI responses with ideas is provided below.
180 responses (technology ideas) were received,
representing the interests or submissions of 79 different
organizations or responding entities;
45 of the 79 entities were private sector;
10 of the 79 entities were non-governmental
organizations (NGOs);
11 of the 79 entities were universities;
A number of entities were States or municipal
governments;
Numerous additional entities (different from the 79
submitting) were mentioned in various responses as potential
partners, contributors or collaborators.
An additional 16 entities, beyond the 79 noted above,
expressed interest in a future NCCTI competitive solicitation,
but did not submit a concept or technology.
Technical Review of the RFI Responses
All 180 RFI responses with ideas were assigned for review to six
working groups operating under the auspices of the multi-agency U.S.
Climate Change Technology Program (CCTP). The six working groups
broadly represented six technical areas: (1) energy production; (2)
energy efficiency; (3) CO2 capture and sequestration; (4)
greenhouse gases other than CO2; (5) measuring and
monitoring of greenhouse gases; and (6) supporting basic or strategic
research. If concepts or technologies were cross-cutting in nature, or
did not fit uniquely in one area or another, such concepts were
assigned to multiple working groups, as appropriate.
The resulting RFI reviews, in general, were limited to screening
and initial assessments, intended to identify ideas that were relevant
to the RFI criteria, innovative, and having overall technical merit.
The evaluations were thorough, but not as rigorous as would be expected
in a more formal review of responses to a Request for Proposals (RFP)
where awards would be made under peer review.
Summary of Technical Review Findings
The overall response (79 entities submitting a total of 180
concepts) was considered reasonable, given that: (i) no funding was
offered in the RFI; (ii) the announcement's 42-day open period spanned
the Thanksgiving and winter holiday periods; and (iii) no advantage was
conferred upon the respondent, vis-a-vis a future solicitation, from
developing ideas and sending then in. Even so, the response should be
considered light, compared to what might be expected if substantial
funding were offered. Thus the findings summarized below should not be
considered definitive or exhaustive. The technical review findings may
be characterized as follows:
25 of 180 RFI responses focused on program management
or decision support tools that might help focus R&D on climate
change technologies or related concepts.
More than 120 of the RFI responses were integrative
in nature, or otherwise cut across two or more existing
research and development program areas.
More than 120 of the RFI responses were rated ``high
in overall technical merit,'' vis-a-vis the goals or criteria
as stated in the RFI announcement.
More than 90 of the RFI responses were assessed as
either falling within the scope of currently funded State or
federal R&D programs, or were consistent with such programs.
More than 90 of the RFI responses were assessed as
either falling within the scope of currently funded private
sector R&D programs, or as consistent with such programs.
More than 30 of the RFI responses were assessed as
representing ideas or technical areas that would not fall
within the scope of currently funded federal, State, or
privately funded R&D programs, if broadly considered.
Less than 10 of the RFI responses were simultaneously
assessed as high in technical merit, responsive to the RFI
criteria, and unique or novel, that is, not easily fitting into
the scope of any existing R&D funding program, if broadly
considered.
Although most of the 180 concepts submitted were assessed as both
having ``high technical merit'' and being responsive to the RFI goals,
few were found to fall outside the competitive purview of one or more
of the known existing federal or privately funded R&D programs. The
working groups concluded that most RFI responses would be appropriate
for consideration for competition within the scope of existing R&D
programs. The working groups were not able to determine from the
information provide whether the submitted concepts would be
sufficiently competitive to be awarded funding, compared to the
universe of other concepts that would be competing for such funding.
RFI responses that seemed appropriate for consideration within the
scope of existing R&D programs were forwarded to the appropriate R&D
programs for such consideration. The existence of some RFI responses
that were evaluated high in technical merit, responsive to the RFI
criteria, and sufficiently innovative, novel, cross-cutting or
integrative in nature that they did not seem to fit easily into
existing R&D funding programs, suggested that there may be some gaps in
the existing R&D program structure, where a future NCCTI competitive
solicitation might complement others in the larger scheme of a multi-
agency U.S. climate change technology R&D program.
Procedural Issues Identified
Beyond the findings of the RFI response technical review, a number
of procedural issues, or points of potential confusion, were
identified. In the event that a future Request for Proposals (RFP)
should go forward for a future NCCTI competitive solicitation, these
issues would need to be clarified or resolved. The reviewers suggested
a few potential solutions to some of these issues:
Apparently, one of the greatest sources of confusion,
given the RFI's broad scope, was duplication with ongoing R&D
programs, and the reviewer's desire to avoid duplicate or
conflicting awards. As long as both sources of funding exist
(current programs and the NCCTI solicitation), and as long as
both are competing head-to-head with each other, extensive
coordination will be required among the NCCTI reviewers and the
existing R&D programs in order to avoid conflict or overlap.
One solution might be to focus NCCTI research,
instead, on selected areas that differentiate themselves from
ongoing R&D, cut across multiple federal program mission areas,
or score high on innovativeness or novelty of approach, thereby
exploring new or novel areas of technology R&D not covered by
existing R&D programs.
Another approach would be to encourage proposals with
integrated approaches for a more efficient use of research
dollars, for example, power production with sequestering
CO2, rather than separate proposals.
Many of the RFI submittals identified an idea or an
R&D project that is already being accomplished by other
efforts. Truly innovative proposals are likely to be rare,
given that current R&D programs already have many and highly
interactive mechanisms for inviting, unearthing and pursuing
promising new research directions. At the same time, it is
possible that enhanced R&D along existing lines for some
technologies could have some accelerating effects, with
resulting beneficial impacts on reducing greenhouse gas
emissions. Thus, questions about the relationship between a
future RFP and an existing R&D program will need to be spelled
out clearly. Some sample issues follow:
How will the RFP deal with the varying
degrees of overlap of new ideas with existing federal
R&D activities?
Should a proposer be required to document how
a new proposal fits with current federal R&D efforts?
How should innovation be defined and/or
rewarded?
How should an idea be scored that suggests
R&D that is already funded under an existing program,
or that is closely related to or an extension of an
existing program, or that is a specific project that
could be funded under an existing program like the
Federal Energy Management Program or Building America?
Many RFI responses proposed projects that would
demonstrate or deploy (extend the use of) existing technology
(i.e., develop green building designs, demonstrate energy
efficient buildings, or demonstrate use of CNG or H2
in fleet vehicles). So, another area of confusion arose from
questions about differences between R&D and demonstration
projects, and how each should be evaluated. A future RFP would
need to address this concern and, for example, clearly state
that the funding is for ``R&D'' for climate change technology
development, and not for demonstration projects, or
alternatively, if demonstration projects are desired, then
criteria would need to address how they will be treated, versus
R&D.
Many RFI responses sought funding support for
commercialization of existing technologies, which is generally
regarded as a private sector responsibility, and not consistent
with the federal research mission. A future RFP would need to
state a clear position on this point stating, for example, that
commercialization of existing technologies are not within its
scope.
Request information on state of development for the
technology. It may be helpful to apply the well defined
research categories of ``6.1--Basic Research, 6.2--Applied
Research, 6.3--Advanced Technology Development,'' as employed
in DOD research and development programs.
Clarify the kinds of activities that would be most
appropriate and likely to gain federal support. If it is likely
that industry has sufficient motivation to pursue the research
for its own benefit, then additional support by the government
would not seem warranted.
Other issues arose with respect to who is eligible or not eligible
to respond to the RFP and be awarded a federal grant or contract. Would
there be restrictions on non-U.S. firms, or other forms of governments?
Some suggestions from the review include the following:
Encourage participation and collaboration across
sectors (industry, university, and national laboratory), and
discourage individual investigations, as a means of enhancing
robustness.
For truly novel, innovative (i.e., risky and far from
commercialization) basic or strategic research, a requirement
for industry cost-sharing or co-funding may be
counterproductive, as private investment may draw research to
more tangible or nearer-term focus, and discourage longer-term,
higher risk, but potentially higher payoff, ventures.
Encourage collaboration with foreign investigators
(possibly patterned after the DOE-NE NERI or I-NERI), so that
the best ideas and best teaming arrangements, are available.
A number of other suggestions emerged, provided below, for
consideration as a means to clarify responder requirements or otherwise
improve the structure and facilitate the review of a future RFP.
Provide links to relevant R&D programs and published
technology roadmaps at all the agencies participating in the
CCTP, in order to assist investigators in accessing information
on related programs and technologies and improving their
proposals.
Require the responder to identify the source of all
research funds being used on the proposed initiative. This will
help the reviewer with coordination among multi-agency
participants.
Specifically require information as to whether or not
the proposed technology has been submitted elsewhere to other
U.S. Government funding programs.
Request information on whether the technology is
envisioned to be available in the near-term or longer-term. The
NCCTI RFP should support a mix of innovative technologies and
technology-based solutions--some of which could be brought to
market quickly and others which require more sustained R&D over
years to decades.
Require information on project size and the required
investment to achieve its objective.
Request information on the applicability and GHG
benefits of the technology. It would be useful to have
information on the emission sources to which the technology is
to be applied, and the magnitude of the impact on greenhouse
gas stabilization that the proposed technologies are projected
to enable. Impact analysis and assessment would contribute to
the prioritization process within NCCTI.
Provide guidelines to standardize basic information
provided regarding the principal and co-investigators, and
their affiliations, and the capabilities of the research team
and facilities.
Finally, other issues arose about projects that might better fall
under the scope or purview of the Climate Change Science Program
(CCSP), rather than the CCTP. This also identified a need to clarify
how cross-cutting (CCSP/CCTP) research should be addressed.
Technical Findings Identified
Several responses focused on program management or decision support
tools that might help focus R&D on climate change technologies or
related concepts. While the majority of the abstracts met the criteria
associated with the RFI and rated well with respect to the criteria,
decision support tools may be needed to help prioritize and integrate
the diverse technology R&D and aid in achieving the long- and short-
term missions of CCTP.
With respect to longer-term technologies, technologies and
practices that rely on scientific advances, including geo-engineering,
precision use of advanced information technologies, and advanced bio-
products development, are still at points in their development where
basic research and ``proof of concept'' demonstrations are priorities.
Basic research questions also relate to the development and application
of advanced technologies. For example, there are many opportunities for
research in biotechnology (genomics, genetics, proteomics) that may aid
in managing carbon. In addition, basic research is needed in
establishing the interactions between efforts to improve carbon storage
and nutrient cycling and potential positive and negative impacts on
other environmental services.
Most current and proposed R&D explore individual technologies.
However, there are possible commonalities and synergisms among the
technologies that lend themselves to cross-cutting research activities
in some areas. Such possibilities need to be identified and pursued
early. For example, many materials issues are similar across a number
of technologies, particularly as we look toward advanced technologies
that employ higher temperatures, and pressures. It would be highly
desirable for some of the early NCCTI initiatives to focus on such
cross-cutting R&D areas.
Likewise, a number of technologies may be amenable to integrated
implementation strategies. While implementation is largely not an R&D
activity, there are some analytical issues that need to be addressed to
determine compatibility of alternative energy production technologies,
optimal configurations, and systems integration issues. These
analytical activities are also appropriate to the NCCTI.
Enabling technologies also need to be identified and analyzed. In
particular, issues like land use and long-term availability of
resources or feedstocks critical to a technology need to be examined.
For example, resources and reserves of natural gas, supplies of bismuth
for potential lead-bismuth nuclear technology, catalysts for chemical
processes associated with energy production technologies, etc., are all
critical to the long-term feasibility of some of the technologies. This
is an area that has had only fragmentary attention to date and is
worthy of analysis under the NCCTI.
In some cases, infrastructure issues may also need to be addressed.
This is particularly the case where an accelerated introduction of a
technology may be desirable. Infrastructure issues which may be
relevant include mining, fabrication, and construction facilities and
capabilities. Little work has been done in these areas, particularly
for advanced technologies, and NCCTI should initiate some studies,
particularly to address accelerated introduction plans.
In this increasingly global economy, energy production resource and
infrastructure issues need to be examined on both a national and
international basis. In some cases, sufficient national resources and
infrastructure will be necessary to ensure national security. However,
significant elements of our energy production infrastructure are likely
to be imported. In those cases, we need to assure the adequacy of
supply globally, considering also the competing global demands for the
supply. Given the important of an adequate energy supply to national
security and economic health, this is an important area for the NCCTI
to consider.
The NCCTI competitive solicitation may also wish to encourage
proposals to assess how much the potential benefits of using different
energy technology options, such as wind, solar, or sequestration might
be affected by changes to a future climate, should they occur.
Finally, the solicitation should clearly state that the scope of
the RFP includes R&D on all greenhouse gases (GHGs), not just CO2
or methane. Other gases include nitrous oxide, sulfur hexaflouride, and
other chemicals with high global warming potential (GWP).
Complementarity Issues for a Future NCCTI Competitive Solicitation
A number of RFI responses were evaluated as sufficiently
innovative, novel, cross-cutting or integrative in concept to warrant
further interest, yet did not seem to fit easily into existing R&D
funding programs or the established federal R&D organizational
hierarchies, or if they did, they seemed to fit only on the margins,
and not likely to gain mainstream support. These responses were not
necessarily the best developed RFI responses, but were among some of
the more interesting, novel or unique concepts or applications.
Although relatively small in number, these RFI responses suggest a
number of gaps or potentially fruitful areas of R&D, as characterized
below, where a future competitive solicitation might add value uniquely
by complementing an otherwise robust federal program of ongoing R&D in
climate change-related technology development.
The following is a generalized list of areas for further
consideration, if a NCCTI competitive solicitation program were
redirected at complementing, rather than competing with, existing R&D
programs. Currently, these areas are not as well represented in the
existing R&D portfolio.
Decision-support tools. Numerous RFI responses
proposed various analytical, assessment, software, modeling or
other quantitative methods for better understanding and
assessing the role of technology in long-term approaches to
achieving stabilization of concentrations in the atmosphere.
While individual R&D programs sponsor the development of such
tools, these are applicable mainly to their respective areas of
responsibility or technologies. There is no place where broad-
based tools may be applied or integrated across all
technologies.
Strategic research. Strategic research is basic
research applied to a particular problem or technological focus
area. Many existing agency research programs are either basic
or applied in their missions, and so restricted by their
appropriations. As a result, strategic research often finds no
specific program able or willing to explore novel concepts
along unconventional lines.
Applied bio-engineering. As an example of strategic
research, one RFI proposed to search for or engineer unique
microorganisms both to produce hydrogen and sequester carbon
dioxide. Ideas such as this have not neatly fit into the basic
energy research programs of DOE's Office of Science (SC), as
they may be too applied, nor do they fit in the energy supply,
energy conservation, fossil energy or sequestration R&D
programs of DOE's applied R&D programs in FE, EE or NE, as they
are too basic and exploratory. The RFI analysis process enabled
DOE's Office of Science to examine this concept for inclusion
in its procurement strategy.
Integrative concepts. Integrative concepts cut across
R&D program lines and attempt to combine technologies and/or
disciplines, and may promise some of the highest results, yet
often experience difficulty in finding funding support from any
of the areas. Integrative concepts present unique challenges
for program lines and are difficult to coordinate across
agencies or across traditional R&D program or mission areas.
Novel concepts. Novel concepts, almost by definition,
do not have logical funding homes within the boundaries of
traditional R&D organizations. They may build on scientific
disciplines outside the routine or expected, may be unfamiliar,
or perhaps threatening to other approaches, can suffer poor
reviews by tradition-bound peers, or simply present too high of
a risk for regular, metric-monitored investments. Yet, novel
concepts can promise potentially valuable ways to reduce GHG
emissions, reduce GHG concentrations, or otherwise address the
effects of climate change, if pursued and explored. Somewhere
within the overall program support for climate change
technology R&D there needs to be means provided for funding and
exploring novel concepts not fitting within regular
appropriated R&D programs.
Greenhouse gases other than CO2. Beyond
CO2, there are anthropogenic emissions of a number
of other greenhouse gases, including methane, nitrous oxide,
and several high-global warming potential (GWP) gases. In the
near-term, emissions of such gases may be more amenable to
capture and control than some of the major sources of
CO2. For some of these gases, near-term
technological advances could result in rapidly attainable and
cost-effective GHG emission reduction strategies. Although
other agencies, such as USDA or EPA, have the agency-leads on
inventorying or mitigating emissions of various sources or
these other GHGs, technology R&D programs to address
opportunities in these areas are needed.
Measuring and monitoring systems. Accurate
measurements underlie many climate related actions and
strategies for reducing GHG emissions. Improving the ability to
measure and monitor all important greenhouse gases (GHGs),
including their emissions, inventories and fluxes, across a
variety of media (soil, water, air) and spatial (local,
regional) boundaries, is a top priority. RFI responses included
innovative new systems for remote and continuous monitoring of
GHGs (not just CO2). These included detection and
location of GHG leaks.
Feedstocks and materials. Often neglected in the
usual emphasis of R&D on energy are the more routine economic
activities of heavy industry, mining, manufacturing,
agriculture and construction; which require resources,
materials, feedstocks and other material inputs to their
production processes, all of which have associated GHG
emissions in their resource cycles. One RFI concept suggested
systematic analytical methods to identify, review and select
promising areas for new technologies to be applied to reduce
such emissions, capture carbon, or otherwise substitute
processes that result in little or no net GHG emissions.
Enabling Technologies. Enabling technologies
contribute indirectly to the reduction of GHG emissions, by
enabling the development, deployment and use of other important
technologies that reduce GHG emissions. A modernized
electricity grid, for example, is seen as an essential step
enabling the deployment of more advanced end-use and
distributed energy resources needed for reducing GHG emissions.
Exploratory Concepts Augmenting Existing Programs.
Although DOE has well established R&D programs in almost all
areas of energy, from end-use energy efficiency, to energy
supply, a number of RFI concepts suggest that there may be
worthy areas found outside the mainstream focus of current R&D
emphasis. Reasons for this may be because the field is broad
and the programs need to be more narrowly focused to be
productive. The industry cost-sharing requirements may
discourage risk taking and long-term ventures. The extensive
degree of collaborated processes may result in consensus
building around central ideas, rather than on outliers. In DOD,
extensive R&D funding is applied, yet one of the most
intriguing elements of DOD's overall research program is DARPA,
designed to augment and explore novel, but potentially high-
payoff technology concepts.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the RFI responses indicated that there is broad
interest in participating in a NCCTI competitive solicitation program,
should one go forward. The RFI process also provided a valuable tool in
evaluating and possibly expanding current agency R&D programs. A wealth
of information was provided among the submitted RFIs, and many of these
can serve well as test cases for a future RFP or RFI process. At the
same time, the RFI submittals raised a number procedural issues that
will need to be addressed and resolved if an RFP is pursued. Better
awareness of these issues can be expected to clarify and strengthen the
focus and intents of a future NCCTI competitive solicitation program
undertaken in support of the President's National Climate Change
Technology Initiative.