South Korea’s eco-friendly engineering company Hankook Technology Inc. said it has succeeded in commercializing a coal drying system that produces less carbon than existing ones.

The Kosdaq-listed company opened its coal drying technology using reheat steam to the press for the first time on Tuesday. The coal drying equipment developed with investment of total 25 billion won ($20 million) was installed in one of six power generation facilities at Yeongheung thermoelectric power plant after test run for five months starting November last year.

Hankook Technology CEO Kim Yong-bin expects its new coal drying technology to help reduce carbon emissions at Yeongheung thermoelectric power plant and lower the cost of drying coal by 15 percent to save up to 7 billion won annually.

The new technology will be used to dry low-grade coal with high moisture content to make it appropriate to use in power plants. Most coal power generating facilities in the country are designed to use higher grade coal, but with depleting high-grade coal around the world, low-grade coal with more than 50 percent moisture content has emerged as an alternative power generating fuel.

The company’s new system was developed based on combination of a technology that directly injects superheated steam to coal and reheat steam technology. The reheat steam system is said to be able to save drying cost by 15 percent and emit less carbon dioxide compared to the existing technology that dries coal with hot air. Direct injection of superheated steam to coal can make thermal conduction easy to dry coal at lower costs.

The company is expected to supply the new system to two or three additional power plants in the county, said the CEO.

By Ahn Gab-seong

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