For Release: Friday, October 31, 2003
Contact: David Gillies: (202) 225-5661
COSTELLO ANNOUNCES FUTUREGEN FUNDING IN INTERIOR BILL
Washington - U.S. Congressman Jerry Costello (D-IL) announced today that the FutureGen clean coal power plant project has received $9 million in the final Interior Appropriations bill for fiscal year 2004. The initiative seeks to build a 275-megawatt prototype power plant with emissions equal to those of natural gas. Costello has led the effort to locate the project in Illinois, including leading a bipartisan effort in the House to secure funding for the project
"This is a positive step forward for FutureGen," said Costello. "These dollars serve as a down payment on the future of the project and will initiate further planning and development."
Costello hosted a roundtable discussion regarding FutureGen and what it means for Illinois this July with Governor Blagojevich, U.S. Senators Durbin and Fitzgerald, and U.S. Congressman John Shimkus. Dr. C. Lowell Miller, Director of the Office of Coal Fuels and Industrial Systems at the Department of Energy, made a presentation on the specifics of the project.
Costello believes that Southern Illinois is the perfect place to locate the new plant. The region is rich in high-sulfur coal reserves and the Coal Center at SIUC is located there. In addition, the geology of the region is well suited to the carbon-trapping technology to be developed. Illinois is home to oil and gas reserves and deep saline aquifers that can permanently sequester carbon dioxide.
Coal underlies 65 percent of the state's surface and the Illinois coal industry annually produces approximately 35 million tons of coal and generates more than $1 billion in gross revenues. Currently, recoverable coal reserves in the state of Illinois amount to more than 30 billion tons. Illinois has almost one-eighth of the coal reserves in the United States and one-quarter of the nation's bituminous coal reserves. Illinois' coal reserves contain more BTU's than the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
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