Categories: The Green Room

Is Clean Coal Actually Clean? The Coen Brothers Weigh In

The Oscar-winning Coen Brothers recently produced this ad, ridiculing the term “clean coal.” It’s…

by Alex Shimo on Wednesday, March 4, 2009 12:32pm - 4 Comments

The Oscar-winning Coen Brothers recently produced this ad, ridiculing the term “clean coal.” It’s amusing, but doesn’t give much substantive critique. In reality, the coal industry has done much to clean up its nitrogen and sulphur emissions, which our big acid rain problem in the 1970s, 80s and early 90s. Emissions of these pollutants are down 70 per cent, which is what the coal industry means when it says the fuel is “70 per cent cleaner.” The industry hasn’t done much to lessen its carbon emissions to date, mostly because the technology isn’t there yet. Perhaps in the future, the excess CO2 will be separated into carbon and oxygen, or piped underground (both options currently being researched), but the technology is going to need decades of research and massive investment. Plans to build the US’s first CO2 storage coal-fired plant were abandoned last year, as the $1.8 billion FutureGen project in eastern Illinois ran into serious cost overruns. Coal is considered so bad for global warming that even nuclear power, once derided by the greenies, is now considered cleaner than the fossil fuel. Nuclear energy has its problems, with storage of waste and security issues, according to Steven Chu, the Nobel-prize winning new energy secretary. Yet “the safety is better and will continue to get better, and nuclear power is far better for climate than coal.”

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  • hosertohoosier

    A kick to the face is still a kick to the face, whether the kicker wears cleats or not.

  • http://macleans.ca kc

    “Clean coal harnesses the awesome power of the word clean”!
    Satire is a bitch aint she!

  • Sam

    My crack cocaine use is down 70% and now I just polish off clean sanctioned alcohol. Happy.

  • Rick

    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.

    Taking the CO2, and turning it into carbon and oxygen is moronic!!! If you want that just don't burn coal!!! You would lose energy (and have to pay $$$) with that strategy.

    "Clean Coal" is an oxymoron.

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