CEDC: No dust, black smoke with clean coal technologies

CEBU, Philippines - The impression that coal means dust, black smoke, and acid rain due to sulfur and nitrogen oxide emissions is no longer true, what with the clean coal technologies continuously being developed like those in Taiwan.

According to the Cebu Energy Development Corporation, the use of Circulating Fluidized Bed (CFB) Boiler System significantly reduces emissions of the feared pollutants.

In a recent visit to the Formosa Heavy Industries Corporation in Taipei, Taiwan, 10 journalists from Cebu saw the company’s power plants emitting not black, but white smoke. In fact, the power plants, Hwa Ya and Jin Hsin, are nestled next to a river in the middle of the city beside a shopping mall.

Across the Jin Shin Plant is a manufacturing complex right next to a wafer (mini-chip) factory. The Formosa complex also includes a hospital and business offices, among others.

Ken Tai, Formosa’s assistant department manager, said the fly ash from their power plants is free from harmful chemicals. These are reportedly being bought by cement companies as a raw material.

Chang Huang, chief of the administration section of Hwa Ya Power Corp., said their stringent environmental pollution control has, so far, not received any negative reaction from the people.

CEDC’s three units of Clean Coal-fired Power Plant, which has a capacity of 82 megawatts each in Toledo City, are expected to improve local power system reliability and affordable energy rates.

In order to minimize emissions and control waste, CEDC will use an enclosed coal conveyor system and an electrostatic precipitator that catches solid particulates with 99.9 percent efficiency.

The CFB boiler would reportedly house a continuous emission monitoring system that makes information available 24 hours a day, a waste water treatment facility and the latest CFB boiler technology, which reduces sulfur dioxide emission of at least 95 percent and higher and nitrogen oxide emission to “negligible levels” due to low combustion temperature inside the boiler itself.

CEDC said it is the company’s goal to contribute to the economic growth of Cebu and the Visayas region by addressing the need for base load, affordable and reliable electric power starting this year.

Taiwan, which has a current power capacity of 47,785 mw, has not experienced a brownout or rotation brownout in the last 10 years.

Cebu, meanwhile, is the opposite scenario with rotational brownouts almost on a daily basis since the start of the year. Taiwan’s government-run power plant, the Taiwan Power Corporation, produces 32,281 mw or 67.3 percent of its total power capacity. Private companies, meanwhile, has a combined capacity of 15,704 mw.

CEDC corporate communication officer Mae Catherine Melchor said Taiwan has a power reserve of over 14,000 mw.

This is not surprising as the government-run power reactors have six nuclear plants that produce a total of 4,927mw with two more nuclear plants with a combined capacity of 2,700 mw under construction. Both are expected to be operational next year.(FREEMAN NEWS)