User:John Cummings/Articles/Clean coal

things to read


 * 1) https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tobacco-and-oil-industries-used-same-researchers-to-sway-public1/
 * 2) https://endcoal.org/general/
 * 3) https://endcoal.org/resources/?topic=general&type=fact-sheets
 * 4) https://endcoal.org/health/
 * 5) https://endcoal.org/resources/?topic=health&type=fact-sheets
 * 6) https://endcoal.org/water/
 * 7) https://endcoal.org/resources/?topic=water&type=fact-sheets
 * 8) http://www.energyjustice.net/files/coal/igcc/factsheet-long.pdf
 * 9) https%3A%2F%2Flegalectric.org%2Ff%2F2007%2F01%2Fago_docs-_1696085-v1-excelsior_energy_final_emission_comparison_anne_jackson.DOC&usg=AOvVaw03cZo0EHh3IB23-9Ov2Sbz
 * 10) https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/05/science/kemper-coal-mississippi.html
 * 11) https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/apr/24/energy-coal-carbon-capture-environment
 * 12) http://web.mit.edu/coal/
 * 13) http://studyres.com/doc/15998499/new-unabated1-coal-is-not-compatible-with-keeping-global- ...
 * 14) https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-06-30/-clean-coal-will-always-be-a-fantasy
 * 15) https://endcoal.org/coal-myths/myth-2-coal-is-clean/
 * 16) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-fleischli/clean-coal-is-a-dirty-lie_b_169384.html
 * 17) https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060056858
 * 18) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVZB-7uVu6Y
 * 19) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYVTutmAmI4
 * 20) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTMgOPc0F2k
 * 21) https://www.engadget.com/2017/03/30/clean-coal-myth-trump-carbon-capture-energy-no/
 * 22) https://www.desmogblog.com/coal-lobby-pr-firm-memo-boasts-about-manipulating-democrats-and-republicans
 * 23) https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/burn-baby-burn-98708/
 * 24) https://www.publicintegrity.org/2009/04/21/2885/clean-coal-lobbying-blitz
 * 25) https://www.prwatch.org/spin/2009/06/8402/hot-air-firm-behind-clean-coal
 * 26) https://www.huffingtonpost.com/kevin-grandia/ad-firm-behind-clean-coal_b_210086.html
 * 27) https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/opinion/09gore.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
 * 28) https://www.zmescience.com/science/clean-coal-lie-13072017/
 * 29) http://businessjournalism.org/2017/10/5-articles-get-speed-clean-coal-business-everyone-talking/
 * 30) https://endcoal.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/EndCoalCleanCoalFactsheet2015.WEB-1.pdf
 * 31) https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/news/a27886/how-does-clean-coal-work/
 * 32) https://www.livescience.com/60244-what-is-clean-coal.html
 * 33) https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/23/climate/what-clean-coal-is-and-isnt.html?_r=0
 * 34) https://www.technologyreview.com/s/407539/picking-a-winner-in-clean-coal-technology/
 * 35) https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/06/7-5-billion-kemper-power-plant-suspends-coal-gasification/
 * 36) https://ohvec.org/links/news/archive/2005/fair_use/10_16.html
 * 37) https://books.google.fr/books?id=WQcEDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT234&lpg=PT234&dq=Today%27s+capture+technologies+are+not+cost-effective+when+considered+in+the+context+of+storing+CO2+from+existing+power+plants.+Additionally,+many+of+today%27s+commercially+available+post-combustion+capture+technologies+have+not+been+demonstrated+at+scales+large+enough+for+power-plant+applications.&source=bl&ots=rk-uphynrf&sig=EVqeVvoqV2RPg2SpBPiLqExf4n0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjIhLvMyabbAhVIaRQKHUhaCg4Q6AEINjAB#v=onepage&q=Today's%20capture%20technologies%20are%20not%20cost-effective%20when%20considered%20in%20the%20context%20of%20storing%20CO2%20from%20existing%20power%20plants.%20Additionally%2C%20many%20of%20today's%20commercially%20available%20post-combustion%20capture%20technologies%20have%20not%20been%20demonstrated%20at%20scales%20large%20enough%20for%20power-plant%20applications.&f=false
 * 1) https://books.google.fr/books?id=WQcEDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT234&lpg=PT234&dq=Today%27s+capture+technologies+are+not+cost-effective+when+considered+in+the+context+of+storing+CO2+from+existing+power+plants.+Additionally,+many+of+today%27s+commercially+available+post-combustion+capture+technologies+have+not+been+demonstrated+at+scales+large+enough+for+power-plant+applications.&source=bl&ots=rk-uphynrf&sig=EVqeVvoqV2RPg2SpBPiLqExf4n0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjIhLvMyabbAhVIaRQKHUhaCg4Q6AEINjAB#v=onepage&q=Today's%20capture%20technologies%20are%20not%20cost-effective%20when%20considered%20in%20the%20context%20of%20storing%20CO2%20from%20existing%20power%20plants.%20Additionally%2C%20many%20of%20today's%20commercially%20available%20post-combustion%20capture%20technologies%20have%20not%20been%20demonstrated%20at%20scales%20large%20enough%20for%20power-plant%20applications.&f=false

Clean coal is a lobbying, marketing and greenwashing term popularised by the advertising agency R&R Partners and the United States Republican Party in 2008 to combat potential carbon emission regulations by the US Federal government and local opposition to new coal power plants. The term is often purposely conflated with ??coal mitigation?? used to present the idea that coal can be environmentally and socially sustainable with no health impacts, however the technologies to achieve this either do not exist, convert the pollutants to liquid or solids rather than prevent them, are not economically viable or are unreliable. The term 'clean coal' has been called a lie, a fantasy, a myth, a misnomer, a pipe dream and an oxymoron by the coal industry itself, scientists, environmental groups, politicians and the press.

The term is often conflated with carbon capture and storage technologies and other coal pollution mitigation technologies and less often to wet scrubbers, coal washing, digitization and combustion efficiencies. The term ignores the majority of health and environmental effects of coal mining and coal plant emissions. The term is used in many countries, most commonly by the coal industry, lobbying groups and politicians who support the continued use of coal as a fuel source and often in conjunction with climate change denial. The idea of clean coal is often used to delay, stop or repeal carbon and other pollution regulations and to continue fossil fuel use and subsidies.

History
The term clean coal was popularised by the advertising agency R&R Partners and the US Republican Party in 2008 as a lobbying, marketing and greenwashing term created to combat potential carbon emission regulations by the US Federal government and state opposition to new coal plants. In January 2008 the FutureGen carbon capture and sequestration plant was cancelled when the US Federal Government withdrew its $1.0 billion funding (of the $1.65 billion estimated total cost) due to spiralling costs. Coal fired power stations in the US emitted two thirds of all sulfur dioxide emissions in the country at that time. It is unclear who first used the term.

The initial 'clean coal' adverts cost $35 million USD and were paid for by fossil fuel industry companies including BHP Billiton, Peabody Energy, Duke Energy and Union Pacific through lobbying groups Americans for Balanced Energy Choices and Center for Energy and Economic Development, which have since merged to be American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity. In addition to the advertising campaign this initial funding sponsored two presidential election debates where no questions about global warming were asked. The term was then used and popularized by coal industry groups later in 2008 and has been used widely since by the coal industry, politicians, lobbying groups, PR agencies and the media. The term is often used in tandem with coal industry funded by non peer reviewed studies, authors include M. Harvey Brenner, a retired economist from Johns Hopkins University.

Many companies are leaving coal lobbying groups like American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, National Mining Association, and World Coal Associate citing their opposition to climate change legislation, ACCE lost $27 million in revenue from 2008 to 2014. The term became popular again in 2017 when Donald Trump started to use the term.

Difference between coal pollution mitigation and clean coal
There are several differences between

the two terms of often purposely conflated to introduce miss-understanding and the idea that coal can be used as a fuel source with no ???

Several carbon capture and storage technologies

effort is often made to conflate the two terms to introduce the idea clean coal is possible

ignore the other environmental and health impacts of coal extraction and burning

habitat destruction: mountain top removal

https://www.wired.com/story/the-dirty-secret-of-the-worlds-plan-to-avert-climate-disaster/

The term 'clean coal' is often used to refer to group of several carbon capture and storage technologies but ignores the wider damaging effects to the environment and public health beyond carbon dioxide including:


 * Emissions other than carbon
 * Environmental damage from coal extraction
 * Health effects on miners and the public

It also often ignores the technological limitations, commercial viability, scalability and public opposition to existing technologies.

Radiation emissions
radioactive waste emissions

Heavy metal emissions
U.S. coal-fired power plants emit on average 48 tons of mercury per year, 70% of which are absorbed into rivers and other waterways.

mercury contamination

The average 550-MW Supercritical Coal Plant in the US emits 7800 kg of lead during its lifetime.

Carbon emissions
carbon emissions (what percentage does CCS capture?)

burning coal produces more carbon dioxide for every unit of energy generated than any other fuel source

Carbon emissions which aren't carbon dioxide include methane, nitrous oxide, ammonia sulphur hexafluoride,

Air pollution
PM2.5

Environmental damage from extraction of coal
Environmental impact of the coal industry

Impact on land
Vast tracts of forests, mountains and farmland have been cleared to make way for coal mines

Since the 1980s coal mining has destroyed 470 mountains in Appalachia through mountaintop removal mining, in doing so destroying one million acres of some of the world’s diverse temperate hardwood forests, additionally it ?removing? 1,200 miles of streams and rivers. Only 5% of the destroyed habitat was repurposed for industry, 95% remaining in the heavily degraded state.

ash waste ponds

land fills

leak

tailing ponds

as coal has become less commercially viable many of these heavily polluted sites in the United States have become government superfund sites

Power plants are responsible for around one-quarter of the nitrous oxide emissions in the U.S.

sulphur emissions cause acid rain and ozone smog.

Impact on water
Acid mine drainage causes the contamination of ground and surface water with heavy metals and toxins for 100s or in some cases 1000s of years. These pollutants damage and destroy aquatic ecosystems and poison water supplies used for drinking and agriculture.

Acid mine drainage continues long after the mining has been done, a literature review by the US Fish and Wildlife Services states “no hard rock surface mines exist today that can demonstrate that acid mine drainage can be stopped once it occurs on a large scale.”

lowers the pH of the water to 4, the same as a lead acid battery

The average 550-MW Supercritical Coal Plant in the US withdraws 420 million m3 of water from mostly freshwater sources during its lifetime, 220 million m3 it emits and steam and 206 million m3 of is emitted as contaminated wastewater.

Sulphur dioxide emissions can cause acid rain

Coal washing which is used to remove mercury from the coal contaminates ground and surface water.

In Appalachia in the United States 3800 km ??do conversion thing?? of streams have been buried by mountaintop removal mining

Coal mining often requires the displacement of large water bodies such as aquifers to allow access to coal seams, up to 10,000 litres of water per tonne of coal. Current and proposed coal mines in Galilee Basin in Australia are projected to extract 1,343 gigalitres of water (over 2.5 times the amount of water in the Port Jackson, Sydney Harbor). Draining of aquifers lowers the water table often making local wells unusable and reducing the amount of water in nearby rivers.

Open cut coal mines result in massive erosion of soil leading to the sedimentation of streams, rivers and wetlands.

Health effects on miners
accidents, mine collapses and explosions

China, 4,000-6,000 workers died from underground mining accidents in ??

reduced life expectancies and increased rates of lung cancer and heart, respiratory and kidney disease.

Coal miners are frequently exposed to toxic fumes, toxic metals and coal dust

Exposure to coal dust leads to coalworker's pneumoconiosis, commonly known as black lung.

silicosis

Health effects on the public
lung cancer

asthma

radiation

a 26 percent increase in birth defects

an increased risk of low birth weights in children

Sulphur dioxide emissions lead to the formation of fine particulates, which increase cancer and respiratory disease

Fine particulates like PM2.5 which cannot be captured using baghouses lead to increases rates of heart attack, stroke and respiratory disease

number of deaths per year from coal generation

current technologies cannot remove all harmful emissions and

pollution controls including scrubbers which remove sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxide, PM2.5 and mercury are not widely adopted due to their high cost.

Coal burning is the single largest cause of mercury pollution. Mercury is a potent neurotoxin which can be passed in utero through maternal blood to the developing fetus which causes brain damage, low IQ and developmental disorders. One in six babies in the U.S. are born each year with unsafe levels of mercury.

Power plant particulate matter in the US caused 15,000 premature deaths in the US in 2010.

nitrogen oxide emissions cause ozone smog and fine particulates, which leads to respiratory damage including emphysema and bronchitis.

terms presents the idea that coal can be

Coal Pollution Mitigation

Clean coal technology

Displacement of people
communities have been displaced by coal mining in a number of ways including:


 * through clearance of the land for strip mining and other mining technique
 * Subsidence causing

Conversion of waste
does not prevent emissions, simply transfers them from air pollutants to solid and liquid waste. example coal washing which is used to remove mercury from the coal contaminates ground and surface water.

simply moving the pollution

Technological limitations
Only 21 CCS plants have been built across the world. Only two carbon capture and storage coal fired power stations have been built in the United States, in Indiana and Florida, whose purpose was to capture sulphur and other pollutants. Neither plant captured and stored the CO2. The plants were online only 60 - 70% of the time, less than the 90-95% uptime required by the power industry.

The Boundary Dam Power Station in Saskatchewan, Canada suffered from technical and design issues, operating 40% of the time in its first year of operation.

not proved to be commercially viable, quickly reducing costs for renewable energy technologies

least polluting coal fired plants produce ?? as renewable sources and twice as much as gas fired plants

capture carbon in coal seams, oilfields or salt mines

Massachusetts Institute of Technology study The Future of Coal estimates that the first commercial carbon capture and storage plant won't be operation until 2030 at the earliest.

In 2007 the Edison Electric Institute (which represents most US power generators) stated to the United States House Select Committee that commercial deployment of CCS technology will require 25 years research at a cost of at least $20bn.

Cancelled US project

Infrastructure to build CCS technology at scale would require continual funding of the coal industry.

Executives at Southern Company who managed the $7.5bn (first estimated to cost $2.4bn) Kemper Project power plant knew of and covered up construction issues and design flaws years before the scheme collapsed. Southern Company hired the consultancy firm World Oil Services which found Kemper would be 30-45% operational of the time during its first three to five years.

Motivations for use of the term
The term clean coal is used as part of a series of strategies used by coal lobbyists and politicians to shift goalposts around carbon emissions, whilst still lobbying for continued coal usage and subsidies.

steps


 * 1) Climate change denial.
 * 2) Denial of man's effect on the climate.
 * 3) Downplaying carbon emission's effects on the climate.
 * 4) Admitting the need to take action, but introducing the idea of clean coal to encourage the continued use of coal as a fuel source.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2014/04/coal/nijhuis-text

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a4947/4339171/

""

The term is most often used when lobbying groups and politicians present carbon capture as an alternative to renewable energy despite ??no commercial operations ??number of years??

"There is no such thing as clean coal and there never will be. It's an oxymoron."

Bill Nye quote

Coal industry
The coal industry has spent over $60 million to promote the term 'clean coal'

''Carbon capture and sequestration does not work. It’s a pseudonym for ‘no coal''. "It is neither practical nor economic, carbon capture and sequestration. It is just cover for the politicians, both Republicans and Democrats that say, 'Look what I did for coal,' knowing all the time that it doesn't help coal at all." Robert E. Murray, CEO of Murray Energy.

Politicians
usage by politicians primarily in coal producing countries and used to appeal to communities where coal mining had been a historic

idiological opposition to renewable energy

climate change denial

George Bush

United States
Beautiful clean coal

Under Donald Trumps administration Office for clean coal and carbon mitigation

https://energy.gov/fe/science-innovation/office-clean-coal-and-carbon-management

did not understand what the term meant

Donald Trump has often used the term clean coal

Its been announced that a second brand new coal mine where they're going to take out clean coal, meaning they're taking out coal, they're going to clean it, is opening in the state of Pennsylvania .

"end the war on coal and have clean coal, really clean coal."

"We have ended the war on American energy and we have ended the war on beautiful, clean coal” Donald Trump, 2018 State of the Union address. John McCain

Barack Obama

Australia
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jan/11/clean-coal-advocacy-group-says-businesses-crippled-by-power-bills

United Kingdom
"cleaner coal" Kingsnorth

The International Energy Agency Clean Coal Centre is sponsored by some of the largest coal companies in the world including Anglo American, Banpu, BHEL, BRICC, EPPEI, Dubai Electricity and Water Authority, Doosan Babcock, GE Power, Greenbank and SUEK.

John Hutton, whilst Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform of the UK government claimed that one third of electricity generation in the United Kingdom could be generated using CCS by 2030.

Usage by lobbying groups
American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity

shrunk

Usage by PR agencies
List of PR companies promoting the term 'clean coal'

Technological limitations
Only 21 CCS plants have been built across the world. Only two carbon capture and storage coal fired power stations have been built in the United States, in Indiana and Florida, whose purpose was to capture sulphur and other pollutants. Neither plant captured and stored the CO2. The plants were online only 60 - 70% of the time, less than the 90-95% uptime required by the power industry.

The Boundary Dam Power Station in Saskatchewan, Canada suffered from technical and design issues, operating 40% of the time in its first year of operation.

Commercial viability
CCS is expensive in comparison to renewable energy especially wind and solar as well as natural gas. The Global CCS Institute estimates an annual investment of $100 billion USD is needed to develop the technology. CCS is only able to remove a limited number of pollutants from coal plant emissions and increases coal use by 25% for the same amount of electricity. The capture and storage carbon would mean monitoring storage in perpetuity, adding additional cost. "'Today's capture technologies are not cost-effective when considered in the context of storing CO2 from existing power plants. Additionally, many of today's commercially available post-combustion capture technologies have not been demonstrated at scales large enough for power-plant applications.' United States Office of Fossil Energy"The Boundary Dam Power Station in Saskatchewan, Canada doubled the cost of electricity in the region whilst in operation.

More than 50 coal companies including Peabody Energy filed for bankruptcy between 2012 and 2016.

25-40% more coal is needed to produce the same amount of power in a power station with CCS increasing both the cost of operation and other pollutants emitted by the plant.

Scalability
The International Energy Agency Global Status of CCS Report found that CCS in operation and in development will be able to capture 40 million tonnes per annum by 2040, around 1% of the 4,000 million tonnes per annum needed to avoid over 2 degrees of warming if energy was produced by coal.

Public opposition
In addition to the commercial viability of CCS schemes there has been wide criticism of the idea of the public paying the companies who are causing climate change to reduce emissions.