[Platform] MLEV takes a stand against coal gasification!

[Jill Stein]

Thought you might be interested. See below. -jill
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Massachusetts League of Environmental Voters
[mailto:MLEV at mail.democracyinaction.org] 
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2008 10:43 AM
To: jstein at massmed.org
Subject: MLEV EcoPolitics: Election Victories; Climate Change;
Greenwashing
 
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Greenwashing Clean Coal

You can't watch presidential debates this year without seeing an ad
<http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=iSh3Gzy%2FDLGSNP
A5BaPE1Wrm52SeOUoM>  for "clean coal", America's power. So what's the
deal? Can dirty coal become clean and help us reduce our dependence on
foreign energy sources? Or maybe this is just putting lipstick on a pig.

The development of new technologies has made coal a hot topic these
days. Clean coal is a term for many technologies from scrubbers that
reduce sulfur dioxide to capturing carbon dioxide. Advocates claim that
through a process known as "capture and sequestration", the carbon
emitted from coal plants can be captured and contained on site to be
transported and stored deep into the earth. Scientists believe that this
could certainly work to reduce CO2 emissions, but the question is for
how long and at what cost? Carbon from smokestacks is difficult to
capture and must be done through a process called gasification, which
concentrates the CO2 emissions of the plant. Unfortunately, about 25
percent of the energy created through this process is needed to operate
the plant, making it inefficient and extremely costly. 
And then there is the issue with transport and liquidification. Since
the coal cannot simply be pumped back into the earth below the plant due
to the incapabilities of coal rocks to store carbon, it must be
transported to an area with these capabilities. Then it must be
liquefied before it is pumped into the ground. Again, this process is
extremely expensive and uses about 20 percent of the energy generated at
the plant in the first place. 
Okay, so even the federal government that has been giving out billions
of dollars in loans to coal-fired power plants has decided to suspend
<http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=UDHubbFWf127uo%2
B9184TsQ9gr21MIlz%2F>  the program until further analysis can be done
due to environmental concerns and the rising costs of construction.
Maybe this clean coal thing isn't as great as it appeared at first
blush. Currently, a conference committee in the Massachusetts
legislature is ironing out final details of an energy bill that included
support for liquefied coal in the House version. We urge the conferees
to not include liquefied coal as a renewable, clean resource. This is
not a viable solution right now to reducing our greenhouse gas
emissions.
C2005 Massachusetts League of Environmental Voters - info at mlev.org -
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