After Gutenberg

jcwinnie

Photo: j3net via flickr

Writing for Ecopolitology, Tim Hurst believes that the heyday for coal is near its end.

Good thing, Tim, because otherwise it is end of life as we know it on the planet.

As plans for new coal-fired power plants are being canceled at unprecedented rates, and the possibility of a carbon tax looms large on the American horizon, state legislatures are scrambling to come up with proposals to spur new types of energy development that will not contribute to the planet’s rising GHG problem.

And, in Indiana, despite a recent poll suggesting that 73 percent of Hoosier-state residents were in favor of HB1112, a bill that would have required investor-owned utilities to generate 10 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2018, it did not make it out of Committee on Thursday. The Indiana House Commerce, Energy and Utilities Committee defeated the bill by a vote of 8-3. By itself, that does not sound like good news. However, upon further inspection, it turns out that this bill may be better off dead anyway. Why? Coal.

Indiana’s energy portfolio is 95 percent dependent on coal. HB1112 was the first time for renewable energy legislation to be voted on in Indiana that did not include incentives for coal.

The bill was scuttled in committee because the Chair (also the bill’s sponsor), refused to hear amendments that would include incentives for the elusive technologies of ‘clean coal.’ Rep. Dave Crooks (D-Washington) said, “My desire was that if we’re going to debate a renewable energy bill in this state it needs to be a pure renewable bill.” Crooks failed to garner the support of his vice-chair, Rep. Kreg Battles (D-Vincennes) who said, “I’ve made it very clear that I will support renewables, but I don’t want to put clean coal at a disadvantage.”

Jesse Kharbanda, executive director of the Hoosier Environmental Council, said the vote would have been a ‘golden opportunity’ for Indiana to send a message to out-of-state investors that Indiana was open for renewable energy business. “Sadly that welcome message was not sent,” said Kharbanda.

I understand why environmental groups would want a renewable energy standard in Indiana, but I am surprised they are crying so loudly about the defeat of this particular one.

First off, a 10% renewable energy standard is rather paltry. Second, there is no such thing as clean coal. There are, however, plenty of other clean technologies that do need investors and policy support.

Coal’s heyday is near its end. And I applaud Rep. Crooks for taking a stand against Big Coal.

Crooks indicated that it is still possible for a renewable energy bill to be revived this session, but that it was not very likely.

jcwinnie

Jesse Jenkins opines that, running scared from the increasingly powerful, No Coal movement, the coal industry is trying to buy the 2008 elections.

According to AP, the coal industry is spending tens of millions of dollars on advertising and fake “grassroots” front groups to make sure that whoever wins in November, coal’s future is secure. But the youth climate movement isn’t going to let them get away with it!

We’re already going toe-to-toe with the coal-front group “Americans for Balanced Energy Choices” on the ground in primary states. We’re fighting proposed coal plants across the country and beating back the coal rush. We’ve pushed banks to scrutinize investments in dirty energy. We’re spending our spring breaks fighting dirty energy extraction and mountain top removal at Mountain Justice Spring Break, and we’re going to be a force to be reckoned with in the 2008 elections. And now we’re talking about a nationally-unified “No Coal!” effort and nationwide actions against fossil fuels on Fossil Fools Day.

jcwinnie

Writing for the Washington Post, Jeff Biggers observes:

Clean coal: Never was there an oxymoron more insidious, or more dangerous to our public health. Invoked as often by the Democratic presidential candidates as by the Republicans and by liberals and conservatives alike, this slogan has blindsided any meaningful progress toward a sustainable energy policy.

jcwinnie

“World coal consumption and production in 2006 was about 6 billion metric tons according to the World Coal Institute. WEC (the World Energy Council) puts recoverable reserves throughout the world at 850 billion metric tons. So, at current rates of production and consumption, we can expect global coal reserves to last some 140 years.

Howsoever, “global coal reserve estimates are of “poor quality” and may be lower than we think, as one recent German study noted (here).” Similar data about U.S. reserves came from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences last year:

Present estimates of coal reserves are based upon methods that have not been reviewed or revised since their inception in 1974, and much of the input data were compiled in the early 1970’s. Recent programs to assess reserves in limited areas using updated methods indicate that only a small fraction of previously estimated reserves are actually minable reserves.

Professor Romm warns that estimates of world recoverable coal reserves have declined slowly but steadly. For the past two decades they have declined by a total of about 15%, i.e., more than 150 billion tons. “Indeed, they have dropped 7% from end of 2002 to end of 2005, according to the WEC.”

As one energy analyst put it (here), “Reserves figures are dropping far more quickly than actual extraction.”

For further analysis that suggests estimates of coal reserves are over inflated reserves, refer to the website maintained by Professor David Rutledge of CalTech.

jcwinnie

Speaking of crimes against humanity, “figuring out a way to keep using coal,” observes WSJ economics analyst Keith Johnson, “has become a central plank in energy policy—including subsidies. Whether that coal is “clean” or not seems secondary.” [Cue Emperor Palpatine theme]

jcwinnie

Presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and John McCain have pledged their support for improving government “clean coal” programs. And, by relaying a recent story written by Ken Ward for the Charleston Gazzette, Jesse Jenkins reminds us just how much clean coal is a scam.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Federal policy-makers have taken few of the steps necessary if greenhouse emissions from coal-fired power plants are to be captured and stored underground, according to a new government report.

Coal industry backers are banking that “carbon capture and storage” will allow the industry to survive efforts to control global climate change.

But the U.S. Government Accountability Project report, released this week, adds to growing concerns that the technology isn’t ready now – and might not be for a long time.

GAO investigators cited underdeveloped and costly emissions-capture technology and legal uncertainties about the permitting and liability for carbon dioxide that would be stored underground. National studies, industry leaders and top scientists have all pointed to key problems with CCS becoming a reality, the GAO noted.

“Federal agencies have begun to address some CCS barriers but have yet to comprehensively address the full range of issues that would require resolution for commercial-scale CCS deployment,” the GAO said in a 69-page study made public Tuesday.

GAO officials also concluded that widespread deployment of CCS is unlikely to happen unless Congress passes binding limits on carbon dioxide emissions.

“The absence of a national strategy to control CO2 emissions not only leaves the regulated community with little incentive to reduce their emissions, it also leaves regulators with little reason to devise the practical arrangements necessary to implement the reductions,” the GAO report said.

Scientists are becoming increasingly concerned about finding a way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, while dealing with increasing worldwide demand for energy. Despite this concern, atmospheric concentrations carbon dioxide and emissions of the heat-trapping gas continue to increase.

Coal-fired power plants are among the largest sources of carbon dioxide emissions worldwide. In the United States, coal plants account for about one-third of total CO2 emissions.

In the U.S., coal provides about half of the nation’s electricity. And because it is abundant and cheap – when environmental factors are not considered – coal is growing as an energy source in China, India and other parts of the developing world.

Both the International Energy Agency and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have cited CCS as a promising route for continued coal use, while mitigating carbon dioxide emissions.

But the GAO outlined a variety of major hurdles that U.S. government agencies are doing little to overcome:

• Department of Energy research has focused on capturing emissions from coal gasification plants, instead of using CCS on existing, traditional coal plants that are likely to remain in service for years.
• The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has not issued guidance for how federal waste disposal laws would apply to CCS, or how the Clean Air Act applies to power plants that install the technology.
• Other agencies, including the Transportation and Interior departments, have not addressed other important issues, such as a regulatory regimen for CO2 transportation pipelines and other infrastructure, and liability for any storage under public lands.

GAO officials also found significant barriers in terms of cost and the lack of any large-scale demonstrations that CCS works.

In addition, CCS requires huge amounts of energy itself, meaning that the process sucks electricity away from any power plant where it is installed. One DOE study estimated that CCS could nearly double the retail cost of electricity.

The GAO report is a much stronger indictment than the recent, “half a wedge” analysis appearing in Climate Progress:

CCS has four fundamental problems that have reduced enthusiasm for it recently and limited its likely role:

1. Cost: Coal plants with CCS are very expensive today. The total extra cost for this process, including geological storage in sealed underground sites, is currently quite high, $30 to $80 a ton of carbon dioxide, according to the Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy, “Carbon Sequestration R&D Overview.” And that is on top of the cost of new coal plants, which have become very expensive. In the future, it seems rather unlikely that CCS would be a low-cost solution. The modeling work done for the California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) on how to comply with the AB32 law (California’s Global Warming Solutions Act), online here, puts the cost of coal gasification with carbon capture and storage at a staggering 16.9 cents per kWh. Energy efficiency along with lots of low-carbon generation sources beat that easily now or will very soon.
2. Timing: The world does not even have a single large-scale (300+ MW) coal plant with CCS anywhere in the world. The first moderate-sized (30 MW) pilot plant with CCS just started up this month in Germany. Earlier this year, President Bush dropped the mismanaged ‘NeverGen’ clean coal project. In the past year, most governments and most U.S. utilities have scaled back, delayed, or cancel their planned CCS projects (see below). As Howard Herzog of MIT’s Laboratory for Energy and the Environment said in Feburary “How can we expect to build hundreds of these plants when we’re having so much trouble building the first one?“
3. Scale: We need to put in place a dozen or so clean energy “stabilization wedges” by mid-century to avoid catastrophic climate outcomes — see “Is 450 ppm (or less) politically possible? Part 1.” For CCS to be even one of those would require a flow of CO2 into the ground equal to the current flow of oil out of the ground. That would require, by itself, re-creating the equivalent of the planet’s entire oil delivery infrastructure, no mean feat.
4. Permanence and transparency: If Putin’s Russia said it was sequestering 100 million tons of CO2 in the ground permanently, and wanted other countries to pay it billions of dollars to do so, would anyone trust them? No. The potential for fraud and bribery are simply too enormous. But would anyone trust China? Would anyone trust a U.S. utility, for that matter? We need to set up some sort of international regime for certifying, monitoring, verifying, and inspecting geologic repositories of carbon — like the U.N. weapons inspections systems. The problem is, this country hasn’t been able to certify a single storage facility for a high-level radioactive waste after two decades of trying and nobody knows how to monitor and verify underground CO2 storage. It could take a decade just to set up this system.

jcwinnie

Writing for the Huffington Post, Gillian Caldwell observes that both presidential campaigns and our Congress are missing the point.

In noting that the “bailout” bill gives $25 billion in tax credits to the coal industry, she expresses concern that our elected representatives fail to understand that “conventional coal-burning power plants are the leading cause of global warming pollution in the United States.”

Sadly, it is Gillian that fails to get the point. Our duly elected representative know that coal plants are a major source of green house gases; and. they are going to do what Emperor Fossil wants them to do rather than what is good for life as we know it on the planet. How else, Ms. Caldwell, could they afford those paid political advertisements to assure us that they care?