Obama Vs. Gore? Coal Debate Heats Up (VIDEO)

Though President Obama's EPA seems to be cautious about coal, the President's own stance remains unclear. During the presidential campaign, he (like his opponent, Senator McCain) frequently mentioned and praised the idea of "clean coal."

But environmentalists -- and victims of massive coal spills -- will tell you that "clean coal" doesn't exist. And around the time Obama was talking about "clean coal" on the campaign trail, former Vice President Al Gore was encouraging civil disobedience against coal.

That's the crux of a new Bloomberg piece that frames the clean coal debate as one between Gore and Obama:

The Gore-Obama split illustrates a growing debate in the U.S. as the new president attempts to deliver on his promise to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the country 80 percent by 2050. Depending on who's speaking, coal is either the villain or part of the solution.

"The coal groups are saying we need clean coal," said Mark Maddox, the former head of the Energy Department's fossil energy office under former President George W. Bush, in an interview. "Environmentalists are saying there is no clean coal, and we aren't going to help you get it."

The Bloomberg story mentions the ad wars between the "clean coal" camp and environmentalists. Here's the ad claiming to show a "clean coal" facility -- revealing that it's nothing but empty land.

But coal supporters are using Obama campaign footage like this, playing the divide:

Now bloggers are taking the initiative to make their own videos. In this one, "Clean Coal" ads are juxtaposed with images from the massive Roane County, Tenn., coal ash spill whose health effects are still unclear:

And one more video -- in which Gore says that "clean coal is like healthy cigarettes:"

Plenty of large news sources have come around to pointing out the problem with ever calling coal "clean." The New York Times published an editorial called "The Crumbling Clean Coal Myth." TIME ran a piece called "Exposing The Myth Of Clean Coal Power." The Washington Post: "Clean Coal? Don't Try To Shovel That."

But now that Obama is in office, he's going to face pressure from all sides on coal -- so what will that showdown look like? Already his Secretary of Energy has had to walk back an admission of his hatred for coal from this speech at UC-Berkley in which he said "Coal is my worst nightmare:"

Comments

[Chopin]

The following web-link article describes 500 MegaWatts to 1 GigaWatts (=1Billion­Watts=1,00­0,000,000W­atts) generated from offshore wind farms driven by high tech wind turbines --- enough to power entire cities of 300,000--500,000 homes !!!

People should update their knowledge base, before they can knowledgeably and objectively discuss this important topic. The offshore windpower capacities in Denmark and UK are WAY ahead, and leading the world in techonological innovation, investment commitment, and profitable commercialization.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/oct/21/windpower-renewableenergy1

There's a dynamic competitive world outside. WAKE UP, Americans, ... W_A_K_E .... U_P !!!

[Chopin]

The proven technology is already here: (see this web-link article)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/oct/21/windpower-renewableenergy1

Wishing will not make it happen. Only a deliberate massive government investment in the infrastructure and technology will provide the basic support, and provide the necessary incentive to kickstart a new energy industrial base. UK and Denmark are successfully leading the way.

Strategically locate some of the wind turbine manufacturing plants in coal producing states to facilitate the employment transition to windpower.

What are YOU waiting for? What are WE the people waiting for? What is this nation waiting for? Divine intervention?

[Greenguy25]

President Obama may have taken the rally cry of the clean coal advocates to heart during the campaign without really having a clue as to what it was or even if the technology existed and he should be excused because he was running for office and that's what politicians do.

But to say that he really stands behind those rally cries and is in a battle with Gore, is just misleading at best. I assure you that once given the facts, a man as intellgent as Obama will rethink that position. Maybe this is the reason they have a staff of really smart people around them. In fact maybe that is Gore's purpose and not one of opposition.

Gotta love the press, create differences where there are none and bam, we just sold some papers

http://www.greensceneems.com

[Myke T]

Man-made global warming and Al (do as I say, not as I do) Gore are a fraud... It`s all about future taxing, and cap and trade schemes. The stuff this guy says is ridiculous, and what`s even more ridiculous is people believe it.



http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=288952680655100870


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4860344067427439443

[Exusian]

Saying anthropogenic global warming is a hoax does not make it so,
no matter how many times you repeat the mantra.

[Myke T]

World renowned scientists, and former UN IPCC scientists also say it`s so.



http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=2158072e-802a-23ad-45f0-274616db87e6

[Exusian]

Ah, you global warming/climate change deniers/he­cklers/obf­uscators do love your little lists of names, don't you?

Despite the fact that they are easily shown to be filled with names of those who 1) are not scientists at all, 2) are or were trained and employed in some scientific or technical field but have padded their resume to make it sound like they are more qualified than they are, 3) may be scientists in some field but lack any qualifications what so ever to comment on climate science, 4) are retired or even dead, 5) are real climate scientists who have had their words taken out of context and twisted to make it sound like they do not support the scientific consensus, when in fact they actually do.

These bogus lists, like the one compiled by Marc Morano, aide to Senator "I never saw an oil industry donation I would turn down" Inhofe, are nothing more than appeals to false authority intended to deliberately dupe ignorant gullible foo ls.

And they obviously hit on-target with mykie.

[clifflyon]

Gore called for civil disobendience but seems unwilling to 'walk the talk'

We need more Tim DeChristophers www.bidder70.orgg) willing to risk prison to stop the insanity.

I was talking to Tim yesterday after his press conference. If he isn't charged, he wants to use the $100k raised to help others do civil disobedience and provide legal resources.

If you are thinking about real action, we are organizing through www.PeacefulUprising.org and looking to coordinate with partners and networks with lots of feet on the ground already.

Thanks!

[Chopin]

Civil disobedience against social injustice brings attention to the cause of justice. Like civil rights and racial equality, the issues are relatively clear and easy for most people to understand at the visceral and emotional levels, and take stands.

Civil disobedience in a more complex case of resource utilization, such as coal technology versus green renewable energies, the issues are not immediately clear and obvious at the visceral level. Therefore it is not as effective as a tool of persuasion. In many instances, the vested commercial interests succeed in public misinformation, with the active or quiet connivance of the mass media to muddy up the issues and arguments, and marginalize the participants. I question if the advocates are not using the wrong ineffective tools for the job of patient persuasion of public opinion. Sometimes it takes more than raw emotional courage to advance a just cause.

[DLBSR]

A debate, Obama VS Gore. Geez, this is a tough one. Let me think about it.
1. Al Gore, reportedly invents the internet
2. Al Gore, one of the principal authors of NAFTA.
3. Al Gore, one of the principals deciding to license China to launch US Satellites. Chine pirates the guidance technology and dramatically improves accurracy of their ICBM's targeting US cities.
4. Al Gore, full of enough hot air to energize a generating plant, thus solves US energy crisis.

1. Barack Obama, Harvard law grad
2. Barack Obama, Community Organizer
3. Barack Obama, US Senator

VOTES ARE IN - OBAMA IN ANOTHER LANDSLIDE
4. Barack Obama, US President

[Chopin]

DLBSR, you're REALLY funny, you know that? You made a long list of everything that is peripheral to the central argument in a serious debate -- Is coal technology good or bad or worse than renewable forms of clean energies such as wind, solar, geothermal? Some of your points are patently inaccurate, out of context mischaracterized character-­assas.sina­tion attempts. Other points allude to "national security" and "patriotism", without debating those topics headon. Those techniques smell of MacCarthyism and Rovish approach to shift the debate off-center.

I believe I like Obama, his person and his philosophy much more profoundly than you ever impute to yourself. But on the central debating issue of the relative advantages and disadvantages of coal technology, you have not shed one single ray of light. You have only reinforced in thinking people's minds that when it comes to debating for or against strong vested commercial interests, some people would resort to anything to confuse the issue and sidetrack a timely and important debate in this country.

[DLBSR]

Not so Chopin. Read my additional posts on the coal issue. I am certainly not a fan of Mr. McCarthy and Mr. Rove has felt the sting of my criticism throughout the length of the Bush administration. No, I am pragmatic independent with no allegiance to any political entitiy, ideology, or special interest group. After reading my additional posts, you will come to understand that I too know coal cannot be our fuel of choice moving forward into the 21st century. We must however be realistic, coal will continue to play a significant role in meeting our energy needs for decades to come, simply because we currently have no viable alternative providing sufficient generating capacity to replace coal.

[spacester]

Well it looks like it's time to finally get serious about energy efficiency.

Not only does it generate LOTS of jobs, but it provides part of the answer to the question of what replaces coal. It gets us that much closer, perhaps as close as one step away, from having a diversified enough portfolio to get er done without coal altogether.

There are many GigaWatts of efficiencies to be captured once we make it a priority.

Perhaps in the long term, clean coal can be made to work. That's what Obama was saying: American Ingenuity will eventually find a way to make clean coal work.

There are plenty of scalable alternatives: biomass & algae based technologies can step in and get us off coal as the mainstay.

[Chopin]

People should intuitively distrust and question tranquilizing or emotionally loaded words that are thrown into a label to help peddle a product --- such as "clean coal", "filtered cigarette" (for LESS carcinogenic ingredients", "peace maker" (for nuclear warhead missiles), etc.

In this national and international debate on renewable environmen­tally-frie­ndly forms of energies, I am 100% with Al Gore. I trust his integrity, his passion, his in-depth and panoramic knowledge in this field, his wisdom and his critical intellectual and moral judgment in this vital matter.

The "clean coal" label has been thrown around so loosely in the public media for so long that few people really know what it entails. So the proponents of this inherently dubious form of energy for the 21st century have a heavy burden of proof of its worth as a viable form of energy for the future.

[jake106]

Okay, I'm with you on distrusting stances that are filled with emotionally loaded words.

But you trust Al Gore's integrity? Really??? His integrity???? He has NO integrity.

[Chopin]

For argument's sake, I'd assume you favored JorgeBoosh over Gore in the 2000 election, judging from your reaction to Gore. Judging from the past 8years of disasters, I would question anything you say, your judgment about ethics and integrity, and your knowledge and understanding on any complex issues and problems. For one thing, you don't seem to read, examine or refer to any commonly available objective evidence.

[gjdenk]

An investment in wind power produces almost three times as many jobs as the same investment in coal power. And an investment in solar power produces almost four times as many jobs, and energy efficiency, almost thirty times as many jobs as coal power.
Based on analysis of the new energy economy released by Earth Policy Institute, Nov. 2008

[Chopin]

If your figures on relative efficiencies can be easily demonstrated and referenced here, then you should take that extra step. List their website addresses here, so that people can easily check for themselves.

Realistically speaking, coal and other conventional 20th century and 19th century energy alternatives speak with louder megaohones in congress because they have established vested interest groups with multi-billion dollars lobbying and advertising budgets. The profit motives and financial stakes are in the multi-trillions of dollars.

No wonder people are confused. They are skillfully and professionally targetted to be confused and immobilized, and easily bamboozled --- like repeatedly throwing around the label "clean coal" with never any context information. Politicians are vascillating and neutralized because they perceive that the public is not onboard. People supporting advanced renewable energies have not matched the conventional energies lobbying organizational power and advertising budgets. Let's understand clearly what we're dealing with.

[GoingWest]

Being from Illinois I understand Obama's concern. Clean coal is a huge issue. The country's first clean coal plant -- FutureGen was supposed to be build in Mattoon, IL. A town that could desperately use the jobs. I'm a student at Eastern IL University in Charleston a town 9 miles away from Mattoon. It's difficult to make a decision on something that would help and harm your home so much at the same time. I'm sure that Obama knows clean coal is wrong, but just can't fully get past how much it would help, his home state especially. This area of Illinois is fairly conservative, so they went ape when the FutureGen plans were canceled and the county has been trying to raise the money themselves.

[Chopin]

Thanks for your well reasoned insight. It's a difficult choice to weigh easy short term expediency versus long term degradation. It involves weighing relative advantages and true costs in economic, political, health, life and survival, and ultimately moral and spiritual considerations. The individual and collective choices and actions are not simple or easy. But deep down, most people instinctively know what is right and good for humanity and life on this planet in the long term.

[DLBSR]

Well said Chopin. People are indeed aware of the negative impacts coal has with respect to human health issues and the environment. Unfortunately, several state's budgets and tax bases are tied, and have been for decades, to the production of coal. Most folks in the major coal producing states will tell you coal production and the use of coal as a fuel source is damaging to the environment, contributes to adverse health issues, and depresses home values. Unfortunately, many are "married" to this industry and have been for generations, for their livelihoods. Transitions to alternate sources of energy must be carefully planned and designed to somehow limit the economic impact on these geographic regions. Otherwise, the resistance to that transition will be formidable and potentially crippling to the initiative to develop alternate sources of clean energy.

[StopGlobalWarmingBeVegan]

Green energy will not solve global warming, only cutting down on meat consumption, worldwide.

[Hunffingtongreen]

There is no "cure" for global warming because it's natural and following it's own cycle. No, we don't need socialism, no we don't have to become vegetarians, no I don't have to live a lower life style.

[Exusian]

More ignorance on display for all to see.

[Chopin]

1) Bullsh*t, 2) bullkrap, and 3) horsemanicure on all counts.

1) There're lots of proven innovative solutions to reducing global warming caused by higher concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. -- wind, solar, batteries, biomass, geothermal, ...

2) I don't know what natural cycles you're talking about or where you've read it. The recent decades have produced so much accelerated CO2 emissions into the atmosphere that it has far exceeded the normal nature's longterm cycles of CO2 fluctuations over the past few hundred thousand years by almost an order of magnitude. This abnormal non-cyclical increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations is attributed directly to human activities from burning carbon-based fossil fuels.
Make an effort for yourself and your family, and start checking the evidence:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=an+inconvenient+truth
Checkout the Emmy award-winning documentary DVD "An Inconvenient Truth" from Blockbuster.

3) If you understand "socialism" to mean government sponsored and financed social services such as social security to retired seniors, medicare/medicaid to senior heathcare, unemployment insurance for unployed workers, childcare assistance for young families, bank bailouts, housing mortgage bailouts, bankrupt corporate bailouts, on and on .... , then "socialism" is already here today all around you, and you and your family and community are directly benefitting from it, in one form or another. Wake up!
Vegans are free from all the known toxic growth hormones artificially pumped into cattle and chicken, for profit at humans' expense.

[GoingWest]

I'm not sure how that would help. Methane produced from cows and pigs is 23 more powerful than carbon dioxide at trapping heat. Livestock contributes to about 18 percent of global warming.

[DLBSR]

Millions of years ago, science tells us a large percentage of the earth was covered by ice, including North America, the ice age if you will. Obviously, that period ended to be replaced by warmer temperatures, much warmer, thus melting the ice. Man was still a wet dream, dwelling under a rock on high ground in the back of a cave so as not to be drowned by the rising sea levels brought about by the melting ice. No coal-fired power plants, no smoke-stack industries, no barbeque grills, no cars, all idling waiting on mans arrival, but yet contributing to global warming. Perhaps a simplistic and rhetorical question, but a question just the same. WHAT HAPPENED?

[Exusian]

What are you on about?

If it's Snowball Earth, that was 630 million years ago, long before there were any land animals of any kind, let alone humans. Yet it was the slow build up of CO2 in the atmosphere from volcanic activity and ice preventing weathering of magnesium silicate rocks, which is how CO2 is permanently removed, that ended it.

Antarctica iced over around 20 million years ago, also long before humans arrived.

The current ice age (yes we live in one, it just currently happens to be an interglacial period, regulated in part, by atmospheric CO2 levels, see my 2-part post down-thread) started around 2.28 million years ago, around the time that the isthmus of Panama closed.

Thus, the development of the human species has taken place almost entirely during an ice age. However, every single thing you know as civilization, including cities, metal tools, and agriculture, has developed during the current interglacial.

[fumes]

huh?

[1will]

Dueling cults.....­.cool.

[DLBSR]

Cooler temperatur­es....cool­er heads, I hope.

[Hunffingtongreen]

It's a disaster, only radical socialism and the destruction of the American economy can save the polar bear. LAugh.

[usreporter]

Are there many coal related jobs in Illinois does anyone know?

[DLBSR]

Southern Illinois, West Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Montana are all huge coal producers.

[ashabot]

Al Gore is right. The question is, does Obama have the guts forgo a predictably disastrous detour through the coal fields. We all know coal is part of the problem, not the solution.

[DLBSR]

I agree that coal must be replaced as a primary fuel source for generating electricity. The real question is when, compounded by the problem, replaced by what technology?

[CurtisEMayle]

Wind, for starters.

According to Joseph Romm, "The wind-driven future within our grasp can be found in the recent Department of Energy report, called '20% Wind Energy by 2030.' With improved efficiency and a decrease in capital cost, the report found that wind power should cost 6 to 8.5 cents/kWh, unsubsidized, even including the cost of transmission to access existing power lines. And, the cost of integrating the power into the U.S. grid would be under 0.5 cents per kWh. This effort would only add about 50 cents per month per household, or under 2 cents a day."

Coal is about $.10 per day.

[Wilbur]

In just about any argument twixt Gore and Obama, I'm siding with the guy who was elected by the people to be the 43rd President of the United States. Give 'em heck, Al!!

Wilbur

[newshawk14]

This strikes me as a false controversy, I think both Obama and Gore want solutions that work, and
are not particularly ideological about it. Both seem to see the problems as requiring urgency and
sound science backed judgements.