Paper Title
A Study of Coal and Coke for Power Generation in Thailand
Abstract
Thailand government has planned to increase the use of coal for power generation by constructing 1000MW power
plants. However, coal power plants in Thailand use lignite which causes a lot of environmental impact. This paper
proposesalternatives that have less environmental hazard and yieldmore energy, then compares them based on threeaspects
which are energy, environment and economic. The economic point of view is the final decision of the comparison.
The first alternativeis to use better grade of coal which is bituminous.Anotheroption is to upgrade the lignite into lignite coke
through the carbonization process which obtains heat energy as a by-product. In energy aspect, the bituminous yield more
energy than lignite. Hence, the amount required for 1000 MW of bituminous is lower than lignite. However, the bituminous
price is nearly two times more than lignite’s.Therefore, the bituminous cost is higher than lignite’s. In an environmental
assessment, the lignite coke spreads less PM10 but emits more SO2 than bituminous. By evaluation, PM10 affects environmental
damage cost more than SO2. Hence, the damage cost of bituminous is slightly higher than lignite coke’s.The result from
economic evaluation shows that the production of lignite coke for power generation in Thailand is preferable.
Index Terms- Power generation, Lignite coke, Bituminous, Damage cost