Does the Dept. of Energy Need to Carry Out an Research Project to Make Gas Turbines More Efficient? (H.R. 2961)

What is H.R. 2961?

(Updated July 13, 2017)

This bill would require the Dept. of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy to carry out a research, development, and technology demonstration program to improve the efficiency of gas turbines that are used in power generation systems. The program would be used to identify the technologies that would help increase gas turbine combined cycle efficiency of 65 percent or simple cycle efficiency of 50 percent.

The program would be required to:

• Support first-of-a-kind engineering and detailed gas turbine design for megawatt-scale and utility-scale electric power generation;

• Include technology demonstration through component testing, subscale testing, and full scale testing in existing fleets;

• Include field demonstrations of the developed technology elements to demonstrate technical and economic feasibility;

• Assess overall combined cycle and simple cycle system performance.

Certain goals would be established for the program in Phase I and Phase II, including:

• To develop the conceptual design of, and to develop and demonstrate the technology for advanced high efficiency gas turbines that can achieve at least 62 percent combined cycle efficiency of 47 percent simple cycle efficiency on a lower heating value basis.

• To develop the conceptual design for advanced high efficiency gas turbines that can achieve at least 65 percent combined cycle efficiency or 50 percent simple cycle efficiency on a lower heating value basis.

In selecting program proposals, DOE must emphasize the extent to which the proposal will stimulate the creation or increased retention of jobs in the U.S. while promoting and enhancing U.S. technology leadership.

Argument in favor

The federal government is well positioned to promote a research and development project that increases the efficiency of gas turbines. It’ll get done faster this way.

Argument opposed

The government shouldn’t play a role in promoting the development of these technologies. The private sector can handle it without the need for taxpayer dollars.

Impact

Businesses and entities that would participate in the research and development project, and the Dept. of Energy.

Cost of H.R. 2961

A CBO cost estimate is unavailable.

Additional Info

In-Depth: According to a Scientific American article from 2010, efforts to improve the efficiency of gas turbines lead to reductions in greenhouse gases and other pollution, and that combined cycle turbines are currently just below 60 percent efficiency.

The article quoted a general manager for General Electric (GE) as saying “You can save 9 billion pounds of CO2 per year from a one-point efficiency improvement.” Assuming a 59 percent efficiency of current turbines, and using Phase I of this legislation as a baseline, that means up to 27 billion pounds of CO2 could be saved annually, which would jump to 54 billion pounds once Phase II is achieved.

Media:

• Scientific American (Context)