Coal Firm Buys Into Novel Fuel PLant

Coal producer Peabody Energy has agreed to provide $10 million to fund engineering and development of the Rentech coal-to-liquids facility under construction in East Dubuque, Ill. Rentech is converting a natural-gas-based nitrogen fertilizer plant into a coal-based Fischer-Tropsch unit expected to make 17.8 million gal of fuel and 545,000 tons of nitrogen fertilizer annually by 2010. Peabody will supply the facility with 1 million tons of coal per year and has an option to acquire a 20% equity interest in it. The two firms say the plant is the first commercial coal-to-liquids facility developed in the U.S.