Turning Australia’s coal stocks into diesel can help alleviate the energy crisis, the coal industry said.
With the technology now available to transform coal into diesel, Australia should consider using coal to solve the energy crisis, chairman of the Australian Energy Company Allan Blood told the ABC’s World Today.
“There is no reason why Australia could not be totally self-sufficient for petroleum needs using coal as a fix-stop,” Mr Blood said.
The process is already in place in South Africa, and the coal industry claims it is commercially feasible in Australia as well.
“South Africans have been doing it since 1968 in a firm called Sasol. They have been making 150,000 barrels a day,’ he said.
While the transformation process has been considered relatively expensive, he said it has become an economically viable option amidst soaring oil prices.
“We are actually doing a study in the United States at the moment on a large plant to produce up to 150,000 barrels a day and…with the oil at anything around the $60 a barrel a mark, this is an extremely economic process,” he said.