In a time of year when it can be hard to go into public 
without being overwhelmed by Christmas carols, the sound of jingling bells can sicken many of us. And, it is hard for many to associate this season and carols with any form of religiousity due to the mass commercialization of across the spectrum of holidays of Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanza, and ...
And, basically every single religious song has been parodied or spun off in multiple ways so that any idea of purity seems dead. Thus, it surprised me that I was shocked at the latest parody of a set of Christmas Carols courtesy of the coal industry's mouthpiece, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE): the "Clean Coal Carolers" with a set of lyrics that take their truthiness and deception to a whole new level of depravity.
The Clean Coal myth
Last week, Al Gore and a coalition of leading environmental organizations launched This is REALITY.org. Simply put, despite all the glowing ads that you've seen and bipartisan romancing of clean coal, "clean coal" remains not much more than powerpoint slides and technological dreams that might (MIGHT) work in 20 years or so, at a very high cost. What is the reality today?
Simple fact: COAL IS DIRTY! From mountain top removal, through distribution,
burning, and the waste, whether fly ash deposits, particulates into our lungs, mercury in the oceans, or CO2 in the atmosphere.
Going caroling with Coal
You, too, can go caroling with lumps of coal. Normally institutions working to destroy humanity's future don't receive links from me, but the absurdity of this simply astounds. To the music of "Deck the Halls", you will get to cloth your lumps of coal (clean scarfs, hats, ear muffs rather than with ventilators for black lung disease and clothing smudged with coal ash) and then "set the scene" (winter scene, desert island with sailboats in the background, birds flying over green mountains with a sunrise, or a bird on an electrical wire in city in winter -- note, they don't provide more honest choices like a smokestack spewing pollution or animals dying on a heap of fly ash or dirtied snow in the devastation from mountain top removal (MTR) mining. Now that you've set the scene, time for caroling. Your song choices:
Let us take a look at just the first of these:
Frosty theCoalman is a Jolly Happy Soul He's Abundant here in America and he helps our economy roll
Frosty the Coalman is getting cleaner everyday
He's affordable and adorable and helps workers keep their pay
There must have some magic in Clean Coal technology
For when they looked for pollutants, there was nearly none to seeFrosty the Coalman is a Jolly Happy Soul
He's Abundant here in America and he helps our economy rollThumpity Thump Thump ... Thumpity Thump Thump ... Look at Frost Go.
Toward Energy Independence we go ...
Let us repeat, "clean coal" is an oxymoron on multiple levels. But the fantasy the coal industry is trying to sell is that the key coal pollutants are already being capture when, for example, we are decades away (based on current optimistic estimates) from any widespread capability to capture and sequester carbon dioxide. Decades away, that is, if we ever get there. But, if one joins these ever so cutely dressed lumps of coal, you will have the idea that this is already in place, that coal is "abundant, affordable" and already "clean" today. From "abundant, Affordable":
And we can count on clean coal for years to come.
The audacity of lying in such a direct fashion, not even twisting truth, but simply creating a fiction is amazing. The absurdity of creating lumps of coal to promote these lies moves beyond pitiful and dismaying to disgusting.
The families of those 24,000 people dying prematurely per year, in the US ALONE, from coal-fired power plant pollution might not be laughing along with ACCCE's "Clean Coal Lies Caroling'. As per Kevin Grandia,
Nothing like mercury emissions, asthma attacks, and melting ice caps to get me in the holiday spirit.
Some other reactions:
'Frosty the Coalman': King Coal Launches Holiday-Themed Greenwashing Campaign»
Loading comments… 
World largest planned solar power plant: 280 MW, probably will operate with a 19% CF
Bottom line: we are no where near able to remove coal from the picture.
2. What is "no where near able" refer to? It is certainly technicall
Where are your sources? You have alot of words, not alot of fact.
Its completely messed up that they actually got in profession
This Is Reality
There Is No Such Thing As Clean Coal. Find Out More Today.
www.thisis
What is Gasificati
Learn about the technology that can provide clean energy alternativ
www.Gasifi
Global Warming Hoax
Find out how scientists
www.dougla
*****
I would put $$ on the gasificati
The point is that you should not be prematurel
1. In anywhere of this post, is there a call for shutting down coal today? Turning the switch off?
2. Roughly, wind added in the range of the equivalent of 10 new coal-fired electricit
3. In terms of near term, considerin
4. Want to have a research program to prove out some form of carbon capture and sequestrat
2 - There are major problems with wind and solar that limit their potential. Wind and solar are extremely variable, and the nature of electricit
3 - I agree, negawatts are as good as megawatts
4 - Lets also not kid ourselves that wind/solar are any where close to a reality in terms of providing >50% of our electrical generation and replacing coal.
BTW, typical coal plants operate near 90% CF, typical solar/wind operate closer to 10%, so that 100MW is more like 10 MW on average, which is a drop in the bucket compare to say a 3,000 MW coal plant. Wind/solar add a few tenths of a %, not a few %.
http://the
Why don't you hear about this stuff? hmm. I wonder.
But ... what about particulat
But, "clean coal" is now referring, writ large, to the ability to control emissions that relate to Global Warming. Are you telling me that exists?
RE PRC: agree that we've exported manufactur
We DO remove Mercury. TMT15. Look it up. We're bringing it online in several power plants across the country. This is new technology
It is the congresses duty to pass the laws regulating th emissions, if you want to get pissed at someone go get pissed at the Michigan Dems or the Repugs, not coal. The coal industry has a responsibi
End discussion
Wow.
1. Coal has been a keystone for the American economy for over 100 years and help fuel prosperity here. Yes.
2. Alternativ
3. We now know, definitive
No, not "end discussion