Coal news and updates

Coal dewatering plant ships equipment to Indonesia

A project that stirred the South Heart neighborhood for years is quietly emptying its huge white bubble tents outside town and the equipment will soon be crossing the Pacific by ship for Indonesia.

GTL Energy, a coal dewatering plant that operated only sporadically, was all that was ever developed from much grander plans to develop a 17-section coal mine tied to a coal gasification plant whose gaseous byproducts would be injected into oil fields for enhanced oil recovery.

All of that was proposed by Great Northern Power Development, a spinoff of BNSF Railway to develop its vast legacy of coal and mineral rights.

Instead, a much smaller project was built in 2011 to test lignite — the equipment essentially squeezed the water-heavy lignite and pulverized it to form dried briquettes, potentially for feedstock for a gasification plant.

The equipment’s been purchased by Coal Mines of Indonesia, and Nitin Joseph, of Thriveni Earthmovers Pvt. of India, said his company will set up the equipment to improve the quality of its coal for possible export worldwide.

Joseph said he’ll remain at the site for several weeks overseeing the packing process.

“We’ll be putting it in crates. It’s all big stuff,” said Joseph, who declined to reveal what the company paid for it, but did say, “We got a pretty good deal.”

Great Northern spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours since 2008 and earlier on coal and surface leases, project design and permit applications.

Company spokesman Neal Messer was not available for comment, but told the Dickinson Press that the current regulatory environment has made it difficult to proceed, but the plant did generate business elsewhere, in places such as Indonesia, that have a more coal-friendly attitude.

The coal development galvanized Mary Hodell and many other South Heart residents who wore yellow Neighbors United T-shirts and fought for years in zoning rooms and regulatory hearings against the mine that was never permitted and the plant that was never built.

Hodell said she counts the closing of the dewatering plant as a victory.

The early coal mine and gasification plant plans promised jobs in a rural community just on the fringe of oil development, but Hodell preserving the land was more important.

“Out here in western North Dakota, it’s cool to get rich quick. But if not, we’ll be fine,” she said.

source: http://bismarcktribune.com