Underground Coal Gasification
What's New
last updated 5th March 2007
The UCG Partnership
Michael Green of UCG Engineering Ltd and Rohan Courtney, the senior independent Director of Tullow Oil joined forces to launch the UCG Partnership, which has now completed its first year of operations. Its second international conference took place on the 7th February 2007, and included presentations from USA, Australia, China, India and a variety of presentations from the UK on licensing, environmental issues, the Firth of Forth project and the financing of coal projects Its other activities include the supply of public informationon UCG, a comprehensive Member's data base and the development of training and research programmes
For further details of the UCG Partnership, see separate website at
Recent Activities of UCG Engineering Ltd.
UCG Engineering Ltd continues to provide the consultancy and project management service and since January 2006 has worked with a number of independent coal related companies with interests and projects in UCG. It has worked with a major coal consultancy to advise the European Commission on the potential for UCG. It participated in the final report for the Firth of Forth project.
UCG Engineering Ltd has recently prepared desk studies of UCG in Asia and the UK.
ECOAL article on UCG, October 2006
Michael Green's most recent article on UCG can be found in the October edition of ECOAL. In this article, he looks at the technology and reviews current developments all of which are promising a positive future for UCG Underground coal gasification as a method of converting un-worked coal into a combustible gas, which can be used for industrial heating, power generation or the manufacture of hydrogen, synthetic natural gas or diesel fuel. The gas can be processed to remove its CO2 content, thereby providing a source of clean energy with minimal greenhouse gas emissions. The article can be accessed atIChemE Gasification Conference, Barcelona, Spain, April 2006
UCG Engineering Ltd and the UCG Partnership provided a poster paper for the IChemE Gasification Conference on "The moves towards Commercialisation of underground coal gasification". The poster generated a significant number of enquiries from both the coal-producing countries and others with exploited coal resources.
Invited Article on UCG for the Transactions of the Institution of Chemical Engineers, October 2005.
The article, entitled "Going Underground was published in the October edition. A copy of the article is reproduced with permission of the Institution of Chemical Engineers, see article.
International Pittsburgh Coal Conference, Pittsburgh, PA 12-15th September 2005
Two papers were presented on UCG at the International Pittsburgh Coal Conference, Pittsburgh, PA, USA 12-15th September 2005. Both are in Session No 38 on Thursday 15th September 2005. The first in entitled "UCG Comparison of European and US Technologies" by Alan Singleton and Michael Green. The other is "UCG in deep coal seams with carbon capture and storage", by Michael Green, Brian Smart, John Rippon, Robin Westerman, Jim Somerville all of Heriot Watt University, and Peter Sage of Future Energy Solutions.
Forth Basin UCG Study - Heriot Watt University
The extensive UK coal resources under estuaries and the near-shore North Sea are potential target area for UCG. A feasibility study of UCG in the Forth Basin, entitled "the Coalmine of the 21st Century" has been unbdertaken by Heriot-Watt University's, Intsitute of Petroleum Engineering with support from DTI, Scottish Enterprise and Scottish and Southern Energy Ltd. A summary of the study can be found in a paper to the Pittsburgh Coal Conference in September 2005, see useful publications.
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