While projecting that a big chunk of electric power will be sourced from coal steam, the US Department of Energy (USDOE) projected that the fuel cell technology will still have no contribution in electric power generation up to 2030. (http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/excel/aeohptab_9.xls).

USDOE report shows that they are projecting a 70% increase of coal steam utilization in the power generation from 2006 to 2030, a relatively sharp increase while other energy sources are kept a slow increase. As of December 2005, 33% of the US peak demand was sourced from coal while 0% was generated from fuel cells. The abundance, cheaper cost, and matured technology of coal based power generation might be the primary factor in the forecasted increase.

However and contradictory with the expected growth of coal utilization, USDOE also projected that the Sulfur Dioxide and Nitrogen Oxide emissions from these kind of power generation technology will decrease by 65% and 44%, respectively (http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/excel/aeohptab_8.xls). They might assume that inline with the growth of coal base power plants, the technology for reducing emissions will also rapidly develop.

Power generation from combustion turbine and diesel will only have a 18.3% increase while only 20.2% increase from renewable energy sources in 24 years time. The possible reason is that the projection might considered the continuous increase of oil prices and, high cost and still premature renewable energy technology.

On the other hand, US only planned to upgrade power plants that uses nuclear power as a source. The reason for these might be the public clamor and, also, political.

It is quite obvious that US primary consideration in the development of power generation is the cost of power. This is base from the fact that only coal, as a source of power (aside from nuclear), has a more stable and cheaper price in the market.It is also quite obvious that they are a little bit pessimistic in the development of renewable energy sources, specially, the fuel cells.

reference:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/aeohighprice.html

Filed in: Renewable Energy
Local date: December, 2008

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