New York, NY (1888PressRelease)
July 29, 2008 - Stockhouse reports that ("CONSOL") (NYSE: CNX), the nation's largest producer of bituminous coal, and Synthesis Energy Systems Inc. ("SES") (Nasdaq: SYMX), a global industrial gasification company announced a joint venture for their first U.S. coal gasification and liquefaction plant which will be located in West Virginia.
CONSOL and SES also have signed a memorandum of understanding ("MOU") with the State of West Virginia and its partner, the Regional Economic Development Partnership ("RED"), a private West Virginia non-profit development corporation focused on generating business opportunities through job creation. Under the provisions of the MOU, the State and RED will provide financing and tax incentives to the project over a 10-year period. In this venture coal will be converted to syngas utilizing SES's proprietary U-GAS(R) technology. It is expected that the syngas will be used to produce approximately 720,000 metric tons per year of methanol that can be used as a feedstock for the chemical industry. It is also expected that the project will be capable of converting methanol production to approximately 100 million gallons/year of 87 octane gasoline
SYMX is an energy and technology company that builds, owns and operates coal gasification plants that utilize its proprietary U-GAS(R) fluidized bed gasification technology to convert low rank coal and coal wastes into higher value energy products The primary advantages of SES U-GAS(R) product relative to other gasification technologies include greater fuel flexibility provided by the ability to use all ranks of coal (including low rank, high ash and high moisture coals, which are significantly cheaper than higher grade coals).
High energy prices are driving the development of new technologies for lower grade coal and coal production byproducts as a new source of fuel. Some large users of energy such as the US and China have large supplies of coal which could benefit from these kinds of technologies.
As of this report SYMX is up nearly 5% with 244 thousand shares trading.
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