Squeaky Clean Coal

I haven’t written in a while, not that anyone is reading this to notice… I guess that doesn’t matter. Starting this blog and thinking about it makes me think a little more about my actions and stick to my promise to myself to make more eco-friendly choices when I can.

This Christmas I think I made some decent choices for gifts, only a few cheap plastics, the cheap shower liner for my brother who just moved out and the golf ball monogrammer for my dad. I also wrapped them in the grocery flyers I’ve been saving.This new year, I have decided to seriously work on reducing my waste, though I don’t think that I will be able to come close to zero waste, considering my fiance’s love of computer gadgets and video games. More on this as the year goes on.

What I really wanted to write about, is just a little problem I’m having with the We Campaign. I plan on e-mailing them as well. My problem might be that I don’t have a degree in, well, anything, but definitely not in engineering. I am not generally a math or science person. But they keep mentioning this elusive “clean coal” first stating that it has yet to be developed and there is no such thing. Then they go on as if it could be developed. This makes me wonder, this seems to be a load of greenwash. Instead of burning less (or even zero) coal, I suppose it might be possible to catch the CO2 before it is released into the atmosphere, but here, things get tricky. You come across the same problem as with nuclear power waste: where do you store it? I have read that the plan is to store it underground. Well, that will keep it out of the atmosphere, I suppose, but what if it escapes and can it affect our groundwater supply, or field fertility? Obviously we know that it is not good to have too much CO2 in the air above us, but do we know what effects it will have in the ground below us in greater levels?

As much as the We Campaign talks about lobbyists in the government making deals for less regulation, I’m not sure who’s side they are on in this one. On one hand the coal industry’s claims of clean coal need to be revealed in truth as not really being anything. On the other hand, I don’t see that clean coal would be a very good option at all even if it was developed, at least not in comparison to wind, water and geo-thermal power. But where would that leave the coal industry? I say good riddance, but some wealthy CEOs might not feel that way…