The goal of the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) FutureGen project initiative is to develop and demonstrate technology for ultra clean 21st century energy plants that effectively remove environmental concerns associated with the use of fossil fuels for producing electricity, and simultaneously develop highly efficient and cost-effective power plants. The design optimization of an advanced FutureGen plant consisting of an advanced transport reactor (ATR) for coal gasification to generate syngas to fuel an integrated solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) combined cycle is presented. The overall plant analysis of a baseline system design is performed by identifying the major factors effecting plant performance; these major factors being identified by a strategy consisting of the application of design of experiments (DOEx). A steady state simulation tool is used to perform sensitivity analysis to verify the factors identified through DOEx, and then to perform parametric analysis to identify optimum values for maximum system efficiency. Modifications to baseline system design are made to attain higher system efficiency and to lower the negative impact of reducing the SOFC operating pressure on system efficiency. (c) 2006 Published by Elsevier B.V.