nwi.com, Saturday, February 17, 2007 1:15 AM CSTBy The Associated Press

…Rosenberg’s company is helping Indiana Gasification LLC develop a coal-gasification plant that was expected to produce 40 billion cubic feet of gas annually — enough to meet 15 percent to 20 percent of the state’s natural gas needs.

Construction of the plant, which was announced in October, is tentatively set to begin in 2008, with the plant going online three years later. It would employ 300 to 400 workers….

“We need to be able to negotiate contracts for coal on a very long-term basis, about 3 million tons annually over a 30-year period,” said Rosenberg, a senior fellow at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

The plant would use southwestern Indiana’s high-sulfur coal deposits, but as part of the gas-extraction process, it would remove sulfur, mercury, particulate matter and other pollutants, significantly reducing its emissions.

The plant will mix coal with oxygen and water to create a coal slurry that’s treated with heat and pressure to extract gases the company said are molecularly identical to natural gas. It will include a gas turbine that produces steam to drive an electricity-generating turbine….([1] Full Story)