“Clean Coal” Doesn’t Exist
Activists from Mountain Justice, Blue Ridge Earth First, Rising Tide, Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, Coal River Mountain Watch, Students for a Democratic Society and RAN successfully blockaded construction at Dominion's Wise County site September 15 demanding Renewable Jobs and Clean Energy for Appalachia. 11 people were arrested.
Demonstrators led by Rising Tide Boston and buoyed by Allied Music for People shut down a branch of CitiBank near Harvard Square October 7, demanding the bank stop investing in dirty coal.
Al Gore recently defended nonviolent action against dirty coal as the right thing to do in response to coal’s role in global climate change.
National Day of Action Against Coal & Coal Finance, November 14-15, 2008
From GilbertTMorgan via YouTube.
posted by Herman K. Trabish @ 7:28 AM
1 Comments:
The coal industry built an experimental “Clean Coal” plant in Florida to show case “Clean coal” technology. It has never been tested because the coal industry demands immunity from liability. It is afraid the Carbon Dioxide (CO2) will leak out of the ground, collect in low laying areas (like basements) & smother people. They don't want to be sued.
Note that the best coal has already been mined and burnt. Most of the Anthracite in the USA (which burns the hottest and cleanest) is already gone The coal that will be burnt in the future will be increasingly dirty and will require more coal to be burnt to release the same energy. It will take more energy to dig up and transport this higher volume (low energy density) coal.
But the killer problem about clean coal is that to collect, compress, liquefy and pump the CO2 underground takes about ½ of the energy that you get from burning the coal. At a stroke, this would double the cost of electricity from coal. The coal industry will die before they do carbon capture and sequestration because it will destroy their ability to compete in the market place.
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