Coal. It's nasty stuff and it's responsible for 80 percent of the total greenhouse gases that come from the generation of electricity in the U.S. But even if carbon capture and sequestration technology existed to remove these emissions, it still wouldn't make coal clean. From cradle to grave, coal is inherently filthy. That fact should be obvious to everyone. Yet, the coal industry has spent millions trying to convince the public that coal can be clean, that coal is the energy of the future, and that we must rely on coal for the sake of energy independence
A new national campaign, www.thedirtylie.com, exposes "clean coal" for what it is: a dirty lie. It shows that the devastating impacts of coal go well beyond coal's impact on our climate. Coal destroys our waterways, our wild places and our communities:
- U.S. coal-fired power plants spew 48 tons of mercury into our environment every year and are the largest source of mercury air emissions in the U.S. And recent EPA-sponsored studies have shown that around 70 percent of these mercury emissions end up in waterways within a couple of hundred miles of these plants, leading to mercury hotspots across the country.
- All 50 states have issued advisories against eating mercury-contaminated fish, and the EPA reports 1 in 6 babies in the U.S. are born each year with unsafe levels of mercury in their bodies, causing brain damage, low IQ and developmental disorders.
- In the past 20 years, mountaintop removal has obliterated an estimated 470 mountains in Appalachia, crushing one million acres of the world's most productive and diverse temperate hardwood forests and smothering 1,200 miles of streams.
- As of 2006, only 5 percent of acres destroyed by mountaintop removal were used for economic development, while other mountains were left flattened and barren with only scrub grass and shrubs, even though the law requires that land be restored to conditions equal to or better than those prior to mining.
What is even more disturbing is that moving away from our dependence on coal is not an expensive proposition:
- The U.S. Department of Energy reports that, on average, state renewable-electricity standards, which require electricity providers to increase the amount of renewable energy, raise consumer bills by just 38 cents a month.
- In fact, the DOE compared 28 studies and found that in 20 of the studies, consumer costs rose by less than 1 percent.
See what the coal industry doesn't want you to see. Visit www.thedirtylie.com. Take Action. Tell President Obama that his leadership is critical in moving our nation and the world beyond coal. Tell him that we must develop an energy plan that rapidly reduces our dependence on coal as our primary energy source and commits to clean, renewable energies.
Help spread the word: Clean Coal is a Dirty Lie.
In a rate case filing dated November 14, 2008 by Public Service Company of Colorado, the total monthly electric bill for 625 kWh (their typical residential customer's usage) was $61.18 prior to the rate increase being requested. In PSCo's electric tariff, the ADDITIONAL cost of wind generated electricity in 100 kWh blocks is $3.5330 or $21.20 for 600 kWh used by that typical residential customer -- not quite the 38 cents per month in the DOE report you quoted. Thus a PSCo residential customer using 625 kWh and opting for wind energy service would pay $82.38 per month -- my calculation puts that increase at 35%. Plus the IRS gives a tax credit to companies which generate electricity from wind at the rate of $0.021 per kWh -- in the case of the 600 kWh for that Colorado customer, $12.60 per month, which is being shared by all Federal taxpayers.
All information stated is available on the Xcel Energy and IRS websites.
Then we can begin to substitute biomass for coal resulting in another huge drop in co2 emissions. Smart biomass methodoligies could help clean up our forests and provide the financial incentive for a sustainable planting cycle for huge areas that have been neglected and the biological quality allowed to degenerate.
A national system producing syngas could allow us to convert all of our legacy gasoline vehicles into natural gas burning vehicles. This would mesh perfectly with the Pickens Plan.
Google gasification, biomass and FutureGen. Learn about what Obama means by "clean coal" and don't be so quick to dismiss the only quick path to the rapid drop in co2 emissions we need.
This is not to say that the mining of the coal should not be strictly controlled and the adverse effects completely mitigated. Another factor in favor of gasification is that it can use "junk" coal that can be less destructive to mine.
As reported by the Energy Information Administration which provides (as stated on their web site) the "Official Energy Statistics from the U.S. Government" -- in their spreadsheet titled "Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions by Fuel Type, 1949-2007" the values below are provided as the preliminary 2007 carbon dioxide emissions in million metric tons:
Natural Gas - 1,237.0
Petroleum - 2,579.9
Coal - 2,162.4
Other - 11.6
Total - 5,990.9
Given these official U.S. Goverment statistics, coal is the source of 36% of the carbon dioxide emissions not 80% as stated in this article. Referencing EIA's spreadsheet titled "Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions from the Industrial and Transportation Sectors, by Fuel Type, 1949-2007" -- the 2007 preliminary carbon dioxide emissions from Petroleum used in the Transportation Sector are 1,974.0 million metric tons or 33% of the total carbon dioxide emissions -- which is almost the same carbon dioxide emissions as those produced from burning coal to generate electricity -- 1,979.7 million metric tons (from EIA's spreadsheet titled "Total Energy-Related Carbon Dioxide Emissions by End-Use Sector, and the Electric Power Sector, by Fuel Type, 1949-2007").
Let's get the facts straight!
http://www.eia.doe.gov/environment.html
Total CO2: 2,214,837 (in thousand metric tons)
Coal: 1,799,762
Petroleum: 110,244
Natural Gas: 291,236
Other: 13,596
United States Department of Energy and United States Environmental Protection Agency. 2000. Carbon Dioxide Emissions from the Generation of Electric Power in the United States. Washington, D.C. www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/co2_report/co2emiss.pdf.
The figures you (and Goodell) cite include the transportation sector and other fuel uses and help explain the difference between the various EIA reports. Nonetheless, I will change "energy consumption" to "the generation of electricity" to make it even more precise.
"coal....is responsible for 80 percent of the total greenhouse gases that come from energy consumption in the U.S."
Where does that stat come from?
According to Jeff Goodell in his Big Coal book, coal accounts for nearly 40 percent of America's carbon dioxide emissions.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/books/review/25powell.html
You make a good case for a moratorium on new coal plants until....
Mountaintop mining as we know it is illegal and the cost of all that cleanup, forests and streams, is paid for in the price of coal, and..
We install even more stringent mercury rules than are just now hitting the reality of coal-burning plants, and...
We change all the coal-mine safety rules so that the miners are in charge of the safety programs, and...
We add the proper management of waste products like coal ash from these plants.
By which time coal will cost twice as much as today.
But that will not eventually stop coal from being burned in power plants here, and, unless we nationalize coal, will likely promote coal burning in other less-developed countries in the meantime.
So, in order to have a hundred year solution, we must explore new ways to have cleaner-coal technology.
We must make the investments to see that this happens.
The planet deserves no less.
There's no such thing as clean energy.
There's no such thing as safe energy.
We swing on a continuum of more or less clean and safe energy sources.
Coal can be a much cleaner and more environmentally friendly energy source.
Yes, we can.