A 50-megawatt-thermal supercritical CO2 turbine is being transported to La Porte, Texas, where it will be used in a supercritical oxy-combustion carbon dioxide power cycle generation system demonstration project under development by NET Power, Toshiba, developer of the turbine, announced Tuesday. “I am delighted to reach this milestone of successful shipment of the turbine, which very efficiently uses high pressure, high temperature CO2 to generate electricity,” Takao Konishi, vice president of the Thermal & Hydro Power Systems & Services Division of Toshiba’s Energy Systems & Solutions Co., said in a press release.
In March, NET Power, a partnership of Exelon Generation, CB&I, 8 Rivers Capital, and Toshiba, launched an Allam Cycle natural gas power system demonstration project in La Porte. The new system employs CO2 as a fluid to drive a combustion turbine, in turn eliminating all atmospheric emissions from the plant. The process produces pipeline-quality CO2 that can be sequestered or used in various industrial processes, including enhanced oil recovery.
The 50-megawatt project is billed at $140 million, including demonstration plant design and construction, ongoing technology advancement, a full testing and operations program, and commercial product development. The demonstration plant is expected to start operation in 2017.