DOE Starts University Consortium Down New Research Path to Makes Clean Alternative Fuels & Chemicals

Research to Focus on New Chemical Pathways for Converting Coal, Biomass, Wastes and Other Resources into Alternative Fuels

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is awarding a $4.2 million research grant to the Consortium for Fossil Fuel Liquefaction Science - a five-university partnership - for a new research program to study innovative ways to produce cleaner alternative fuels and premium-quality chemicals for the vehicles and industries of the 21st century.

The research could point to new ways to use such carbon-containing materials as natural gas, coal, biomass, petroleum coke, and municipal solids wastes as the source of fuels that might one day begin replacing imported oil while providing significant environmental advantages.

The Department's Office of Fossil Energy and Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy will jointly fund the research in at least the first year of the three-year project. In addition to the federal funding, Consortium members - the University of Kentucky, West Virginia University, the University of Utah, the University of Pittsburgh, and Auburn University - will contribute another $1.2 million, bringing the effort's total cost to $5.4 million.

The grant will allow the Consortium to pursue new directions in an area of research called "C1 chemistry."

C1 chemistry is essentially the conversion of single carbon-bearing molecules - such as those that make up natural gas, carbon dioxide, or "syngas" (a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen) - into valuable liquid and other products.

For example, the process can be used to convert syngas made from coal or natural gas into clean oxygenated transportation fuels that could be used in a new generation of vehicles to reduce air quality problems and improve automotive efficiencies. C1 chemistry could also be used to produce high-purity hydrogen or premium chemicals from syngas or from methanol.

Historically, much of the technical community's C1 chemistry research has focused on a specific category of chemical reactions called the "Fischer-Tropsch" process. DOE has a Fischer-Tropsch synthesis program underway in its coal- and natural gas-to-liquids research efforts, and one of the Consortium's tasks will be to study a Fischer-Tropsch process to generate oxygenated fuels using an iron-based catalyst.

The Consortium's main effort, however, will be to carry out a first-of-its-kind, nationally coordinated research program on innovative chemical processes that may not follow the traditional Fischer-Tropsch pathway.

A better understanding of new types of C1 chemistry could not only lead to lower-polluting transportation fuels but also to the increased use of fuel cells - which operate using the hydrogen of carbon-containing materials - in automobiles and in stationary power plants.

Research might also reveal ways to use carbon dioxide - a greenhouse gas - to convert natural gas into fuels and chemicals, perhaps providing a long-range option for dealing with climate change concerns.

The technique might also offer new ways to produce liquid products from remote sources of currently unmarketable natural gas - such as the gas resources in Alaska's North Slope oil fields.

DOE is also particularly interested in new C1 chemical processes for future use in its "Vision 21" program. "Vision 21" is an effort to develop the "energy plant of the future," an advanced multi-fuel power concept that would produce electricity, fuels and chemicals, and other marketable products with unprecedented efficiencies and virtually no pollutants.

The grant will be administered by the Office of Fossil Energy's Federal Energy Technology Center, the Department's lead fossil fuel research center. In the first year the Office of Fossil Energy will provide $400,000; the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy will contribute $1 million; and the Consortium will add an additional $350,000.

-End of TechLine-

For more information, contact:
Hattie Wolfe, DOE Office of Fossil Energy, 202/586-6503, e-mail hattie.wolfe@hq.doe.gov

Otis Mills, DOE Federal Energy Technology Center, 412/892-5890, e-mail mills@fetc.doe.gov

Technical contact:
Donald Krastman, DOE Federal Energy Technology Center, 412/892-4720, e-mail krastman@fetc.doe.gov