Energy Secretary Rick Perry struck an agreement with Saudi Arabia on Monday to work on clean fossil fuel projects that had the support of the Obama administration.
Perry signed the memorandum of understanding with Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al Falih while visiting the oil-rich kingdom on Monday. The agreement would advance a number of technologies, including a way of burning coal more cleanly called oxy-combustion that was a favorite technology of Obama administration Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz.
The Energy Department said the memo of understanding underscores technologies that would help Saudi Arabia meet its landmark economic diversification plan, called “Vision 2030,” which it decided to create after the country’s budget was nearly cut in half by low crude oil prices that wreaked havoc on its oil-dependent economy.
“Together through the development of clean energy technologies our two countries can lead the world in promoting economic growth and energy production in an environmentally responsible way,” Perry said.
The technologies included in the cooperation memo cover several advances that would make coal and other fossil fuel power plants cleaner by reducing carbon dioxide emissions blamed by most scientists for causing the Earth’s temperature to warm.
Perry is a fan of supercritical carbon dioxide power cycles, which refers to burning coal at higher temperatures to remove carbon dioxide. Supercritical coal plants are seen as commercially viable as opposed to more expensive versions of removing carbon from coal, such as coal gasification.
Other technologies included in the agreement are “chemical looping and oxy-combustion,” which Moniz was a major proponent of under former President Barack Obama.
The oxy technology looks to burn coal using pure oxygen, with little waste and emissions generated. “The combustion of fossil fuels in nearly pure oxygen, rather than air, presents an opportunity to simplify carbon dioxide (CO2) capture in power plant applications,” according to the Energy Department’s National Energy Technology Laboratory.
Also included is carbon capture, utilization, and storage, or CCUS, which takes the carbon dioxide generated from burning coal or natural gas and uses the CO2 for a variety of tasks, including extracting oil from older oil wells. The Obama administration also supported CCUS.
