Low Emission Coal

The Centre's research includes coal reactions, combustion and gasification in turbulent flows, emissions and impact of carbon capture for retrofitted units as well as new plant. Emissions from current plant are also included. The research involves interaction with technology demonstrations within Australia and international developments.

Professor Terry Wall is one of the Centre's researchers active in Low Emission Coal Technologies.

Emeritus Professor Terry Wall was the first Australian to win the esteemed Percy Nicholls Award for Notable Scientific or Practical Contributions in the Field of Solid Fuels (2013).

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My greatest pride would be in helping students complete successful PhDs. I've supervised more than 50 students. I have also enjoyed establishing and maintaining the University of Newcastle as a centre of excellence in coal usage, through two cooperative research centres and now in a national research and development centre.


The Research Program on Low Emission Coal, led by Professor Terry Wall has an emphasis on abatement of greenhouse gases, with scientific research underpinning technologies for carbon capture, such as; oxyfuel, post-combustion capture, gasification and chemical looping.

The research includes; coal reactions, combustion and gasification in turbulent flows, emissions and impact of carbon capture for retrofitted units as well as new plant. Emissions from current pf plant are also included. The Program involves interaction with technology demonstrations within Australia and international developments.

  • Oxyfuel
  • Chemical looping
  • CO2 capture
  • Fundamentals of turbulent combustion

Laboratories

The coal laboratory, one of the main research laboratories of the group, has drop-tube furnaces, a pressurised wire-mesh reactor, a heated grid de volatilisation rig, a pressurised fluidised bed, Thermo-Mechanical Analysis, TGA and PTGA as well as analytical instruments, such as GCs, Micro-GCs and GCMS.

The group uses pilot-scale furnaces in other laboratories for coal utilisation experiments, including the ACIRL facility in Brisbane, Queensland and the IHI rig in Aioi.

Renewable energy sources, unlike fossil fuels are not finite and hence can be utilised in a sustainable manner. Renewable resources are also CO2 neutral and as such, do not have any global warming potential.

The Renewable Energy Sources (RES) Laboratory is dedicated to work on two large programs of study aimed at developing more efficient technologies for utilisation of biomass, and geothermal resources, respectively. Several projects are currently under way as part of these two large programs of study.

These are:

  • Development of a Novel Geothermal Power Cycle
  • Development of a Novel Regenerator for Adapting Supercritical Cycles to Geothermal Power Applications
  • Development of a Novel Desalination Process for Geothermal Resources
  • Combustion Characteristics of Biomass Chars in Pressurised Circulating Fluidised Bed Reactors
  • Gasification Characteristics of Australian Biomass Fuels in Fluidised Bed Reactors
  • Burnout and Ash issues related to Co-Firing of Coal and Biomass in PF Boilers
  • Methodologies to interpret Trials of Coal / Biomass Co-Firing

Low Emission Coal Program Leader

Low Emission Coal Program Researchers