Innovative approach towards near-term reduction in Carbon emission from major industrial sources of CO2

世界资源研究所（World Resource Institute）的里程碑式报告《新气候经济》（2014年9月）呼应了权威的斯特恩（Stern） 2006年的报告，结论是在不久的将来存在巨大的气候变化风险。为了应对这一威胁，有必要减少燃煤电厂的碳排放——二氧化碳的主要来源，但许多政府对实施更严格的碳排放目标犹豫不决，因为它可能使能源生产成本增加70-80%。通过碳捕获与封存（CCS）系统的传统二氧化碳减排手段确实增加了发电成本，使环境与经济发展相矛盾。尽管两份报告都表明，气候变好带来的间接好处超过了能源成本上升带来的损失，但一些人仍将其视为“就业杀手”。***建议通过开发一种廉价、新颖和创新的碳减排选择来进行研究，这可能表明环境和经济并不一定是相互矛盾的。这一选择将大大减少燃煤电厂的净碳排放量，因为现有燃煤电厂大量使用经过特殊处理的碳中性生物质替代煤炭。虽然目前的实践只能提供5-10%的减排，但拟议的研究旨在大幅提高这一减排（bbb80 %），用创新的压缩水或蒸汽处理的生物质代替煤炭，将生物质提高到煤炭的水平。为了进一步减少这种共烧电厂的碳排放，我们将探索一种利用电厂产生的灰来捕获二氧化碳的新概念，从而使电厂的碳足迹为负。通过大幅降低二氧化碳减排的成本，新的选择可以消除低碳经济的障碍。***我们计划研究一些未开发的和几个较少开发的压缩水/蒸汽焙烧工艺领域，并最终将它们综合成一个放大和反应器设计方法。在此过程中，它将在大学内直接培训28名学生和学者，并间接培训约250名实习工程师。我们研究的一个重要方面是开发对该过程的广泛理解，最终开发出一种放大方法和一种创新的反应堆设计。利用我过去开发加拿大首个商业化CFB锅炉技术的经验，我将开发一种新的加拿大共烧技术，通过在生物质（能源作物）生产和加工行业创造当地就业机会，带来额外的社会经济效益，并提高加拿大在绿色技术方面的国际竞争力。

***PROJECT SUMMARY***The landmark report, "New climate economy" from World Resource Institute, (September 2014) echoed the authoritative Stern's report of 2006 concluding that there is immense risk of climate change in the near future. To counter this threat it is necessary to reduce the carbon emission from coal-fired plant - the major contributor of CO2, but many governments are hesitant about implementing stricter carbon emission targets as it could increase the cost of energy production by 70-80%. Conventional means of CO2 abatement through carbon capture and storage (CCS) system indeed increases the cost of power generation that much pitting environment against economic development. Although both reports suggest that indirect benefits of better climate outweigh the penalty for higher energy cost, some still view it as a `job killer'.***The proposed research through development of an inexpensive, novel and innovative option for carbon reduction could show that environment and economy does not have to be against each other. This option would bring about major reduction in net carbon emission from coal-fired power plants by large substitution of coal with specially treated carbon-neutral biomass in existing coal-burning plants. While, current practice offers only 5-10% emission reduction, the proposed research aims at increasing this reduction substantially (> 80%) substituting coal with biomass treated innovatively in compressed water or steam to improve biomass to the level of coal. To reduce the carbon emission further in such co-fired power plants we will explore a novel concept of utilizing the very ash the plant produces to capture CO2 thereby giving the plant a negative carbon footprint. By substantially decreasing the cost of CO2 reduction, the new option could remove the barrier against low carbon economy. ***We plan to study some unexplored and several less-explored areas of compressed water/steam torrefaction process, and finally synthesize them into a scale up cum reactor design method. In the process it would train 28 students and scholars directly within the university and indirectly about 250 practicing engineers.***An important aspect of our research is development of a broad comprehension of the process culminating into the development of a scale-up method and an innovative reactor design. Using my past experience of development of the first commercialized Canadian technology on CFB boiler I would develop a new Canadian technology on co-firing that could bring additional socio-economic benefits through generation of local employment in biomass (energy crop) production and processing industries, and increase Canada's international competitiveness in green technology.