The National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) is one of the Department of Energy's (DOE) national laboratories. NETL manages and conducts research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) to:
- Enhance America's energy security
- Improve the environmental acceptability of energy production and use
- Increase the competitiveness and reliability of U.S. energy systems
- Ensure a robust U.S. energy future.
NETL is the only government-owned/government-operated national lab dedicated to energy RD&D from domestic energy resources. In addition to its diverse energy research and development expertise, NETL is experienced in contract and project management, analysis of energy systems, and international energy issues. NETL has research centers in Morgantown, West Virginia; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and Albany, Oregon. External work is augmented by onsite research in the areas of computational and basic sciences, energy system dynamics, geological and environmental systems, and materials science. Together, these efforts focus a wealth of scientific and engineering talent on creating commercially viable solutions to national energy and environmental problems. NETL's primary thrusts are:
- Leading efforts to make today's coal power plants cleaner and to enable tomorrow's systems to perform with near-zero emissions.
- Advancing cost-effective technologies for finding and producing domestic fossil resources while meeting environmental requirements.
- Working on cost-effective ways to derive hydrogen from domestic coal, biomass and natural gas, and to utilize fuel cells for power generation.
- Providing a portfolio of technology options for capturing, sequestering, and monitoring greenhouse gases.
- Supporting DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy in managing research to make more efficient use of energy in buildings, transportation, and industry, and to accelerate renewable energy options.
NETL's current emphasis is leading the U.S. effort in carbon management—capturing and storing carbon dioxide (CO2) to prevent its emission into the atmosphere, where it contributes to global climate change. DOE's carbon capture and storage (CCS) RD&D objectives are 1) reducing the cost and energy penalty associated with CO2 capture from power plants; and 2) improving the understanding of factors affecting CO2 storage permanence, capacity, and safety in geologic formations. Carbon management begins with the capture of CO2 from power plants and other stationary CO2 sources. At present, this process is costly and energy-intensive. However, NETL analysis shows the potential for cost reductions of no more than 10-percent increase in the cost of electricity for pre-combustion systems and 35 percent for post-combustion and oxy-combustion systems while capturing at least 90 percent of CO2 in the process or effluent stream. Post-combustion capture can be used to retrofit existing plants by capturing CO2 from flue gas streams or burning coal with oxygen to isolate the CO2.
Pre-combustion capture will be used in next-generation power plants using gasification.
In gasifiers, CO2 is more highly concentrated and at higher pressure, making capture easier.
Onsite and collaborative R&D efforts are exploring novel approaches to improve efficiency and reduce costs of CO2 capture. Once captured, the CO2 must be transported by pipeline to the geologic sequestration site.
NETL is working with industry in seven Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships that consist of over 350 unique organizations in over 42 states to determine the best ways to accomplish sequestration in various geologic formations and geographical areas.
In addition to experimental research, NETL's scientists are developing computer simulations of gasification processes and the workings of entire power plants, using two R&D 100 award-winning computing technologies. Insights obtained from these simulations are being used to drive developments in CO2 capture.
To verify that the sequestered CO2 is not leaking into the atmosphere, NETL has developed an R&D 100 Award-winning technology called SEQURE™ to monitor sequestration sites.
NETL is committed to developing new energy technologies and carbon management into low cost, realistic solutions to our energy security and global climate change challenges.
