I don’t understand the numbers well enough to know how significant news like this is, but it’s clear that we’re only going to see more of this in the five-to-ten year horizon as conventional oil stays expensive:
South Africa’s Sasol (SOLJ.J: Quote, Profile, Research), the world’s biggest maker of motor fuel from coal, said on Thursday it was working jointly with India’s Tata Group to acquire coal fields for coal-to-liquid ventures.
“Sasol and Tata are collaborating with the Indian government on the allocation of coal blocks for CTL (coal-to-liquid) projects,” Johann van Rheede, Sasol’s spokesman told Reuters.
He said the company still has long-term plans to develop coal-to-liquids fuels projects in India though it was still “early days”.
Sasol also has similar nascent plans in China, the world’s biggest producer and consumer of coal.
Here’s an article that is pretty comprehensive (for me) on this topic:
http://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/86/8611cover.html
Google: sasol secunda largest point source co2
Nice article Majorie. I also was reading this article called The Coal to Liquid Debate and it informed me what the market is doing with the coal to liquid situation now. I really like to know an issue from all angles, especially financial, because we all know money is one the big driving forces behind what happens.
To marjorie, john, and paul, thanks.
I have been asked about how coal might work in our engine. I needed the information that you all provided.