The obvious beggar’s question is this - why should BNSF get involved in the energy business? Wouldn’t this request make more sense if it was presented to an existing energy company rather than a transportation company? Other than having a homemade source of diesel fuel for BNSF’s locomotives, this idea won’t add anything to BNSF’s bottom line.
BTW - for what it’s worth, we bet BNSF will never build such a facility.
FM I agree about BNSF not building. Partly because the article states that ConocoPhillips owns the mineral rights at that location. And that being the case, I wonder why the governor did not meet with ConocoPhillips.
According to the linked article, his comment that BNSF should build the plant arose from his point to BNSF that they cannot predict diesel fuel costs very far into the future made during the wheat shipping price melee. Presumably, it is his opinion that BNSF will be able to better predict fuel cost if they build it.
What is most surprising is that BNSF is considering the possibility.
OK, Govenor Schweitzer is basically a moron with power.
BNSF has to deal with this, so they pander. It’s all part of The Great Game. Eventually, the “Good Guys” usually win. But they have to “Play The Game with the Schweitzer’s” before they win.
Which is why they’ll “consider” liquid coal fuel from Montana before they say NO.
Remember, BN has experimented in the past with other odd fuels.
Anyone remember the CNG SD40s and the attendant tank car tenders?
So, the Governor works a deal with BN…they build the plant, and then own the proprietary designs and information that it develops, not to mention creating a few jobs in a place where jobs is almost a four letter word, and the governor lays off on the rate war…a win win for both parties.
I concur, mostly. The Gov will not lay off rate rhetoric. There are more farmers than railroaders in Montana. The politicians have been at this game for about 150 years. I see no reason to think any of them will stop now.
Yeah, BNSF is probably just giving lip service for a spell to mitigate those other Montana issues.
The obvious problem that jumps out is that a coal-to-diesel conversion plant has a lot of expensive technology to deal with, thus can only work commercially when the economies of scale are maxed. Such large scale plants would have startup costs in the low billions. Does BNSF have that kind of money lying around?
If so, there’s a few bottlenecks in Washington they should invest in first before speculating in a field outside their area of expertise.
Agip, (the Eni corp) has been at it since the 1920s, helped fuel the Germany war machine, and now is one of Italy’s biggest synthetic producers, along with making some exceptionally fine petroleum based lubricants and fuels.
Personally, I think BNSF ought to just buy Montana and get it over with.[:D]
Coal gasification - high maintenance, narrow specs process
Clean up of H/CO syngas to remove impurities
Syngas methanization - turning the H/CO syngas into C4 by processing it via a catalyst
Methanized gas further catalyzed into a paraffin
Paraffin further catalyzed into synthetic diesel
Keep in mind, the FT process produces a lot of different hydrocarbon byproducts that can also be converted into synthetic diesel, so you need economies of scale to make it worthwhile for processing these hydrocarbon byproducts.
The only recently ethical govenor of Illinois, One Jim Edgar, posed a problem for the Hizhonordamayor of Chicago. Quothe Hizhonordamayor, “I can’t work with him, he don’t want nothin”.
But it seems the "GOV’ of Montana wants something. (Power and Votes to give him that POWER.) Play the game BNSF, just play the game. You might win if you do, you’ll certainly loose if you don’t.