January 15, 2008

Global Monitor (January 2008)

DOE updates coal plant database

Interested in a comprehensive and current list of U.S. coal plants and projects? Check out the latest release of the DOE’s 2007 Coal Power Plant Database. Available as an 8.6-MB Excel spreadsheet, a 20.8-MB Excel pivot table, or a 24-MB Access database, it is maintained by the Office of Fossil Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory. The database, covering more than 1,900 plants, can be found at www.netl.doe.gov/energy-analyses/technology.html.

Dam the Red Sea?

Building a dam across the Red Sea at Bab al Mandab (“Bab El Mandeb” on Figure 5), the 20-mile-wide strait separating Yemen and Djibouti, and using it to generate hydropower could help meet the growing electricity demand of millions of people in the Middle East without further depleting the region’s oil and natural gas reserves. But such a massive engineering project also could take a ruinous toll on the local environment and displace countless people from their homes.

5. Moses crossed another way, at the other end. Researchers at Utrecht University in The Netherlands suggest that 50 GW could be generated by a 20-mile-wide dam across the Red Sea near its southern end. Courtesy: NASA

Those are the overall conclusions of a research report recently published in the International Journal of Global Environmental Issues, from Inderscience Publishers. In the report, Roelof Dirk Schuiling of Holland’s Utrecht University and his colleagues discuss the costs and benefits of what could be the most ambitious engineering project ever.

According to the authors, existing technology allows us to shift and shape the earth on a relatively large scale, including damming rivers to create artificial lakes big enough for megawatt-scale power generation. In the near future, it may even be possible to dam the Red Sea. Such a barrier would stem the flow of seawater from the Indian Ocean into the sea, which is highly evaporative.

Schuiling, a geochemical engineer, says that a dam at Bab al Mandab could be used to generate as much as 50 GW. By comparison, the 33 hydroelectricity generators at Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River in central Washington have a peak summer capacity of 7.1 GW, making it the largest power plant in the U.S., according to the DOE’s Energy Information Administration.

“Such a project will dramatically affect the region’s economy, political situation and ecology, and the effects may be felt well beyond the physical and political limits of the project,” the authors say of the dam. For example, it would cause major disruptions to military and commercial ship traffic (Figure 6).

6. Five acres of diplomacy. Building a dam that would put an end to all ship traffic, including oil supertankers, into and out of the Red Sea would definitely not be popular with the energy-hungry industrialized world. Courtesy: DefenseLink

Schuiling and his colleagues wrote that the costs and time frames of such a massive project are way beyond normal economic considerations. However, someone is sure to at least consider it, because 50 GW of hydro capacity would offer future generations a sustainable, CO₂-free alternative to the continued burning of huge quantities of fossil fuels.