Enviros play dirty on coal, natural gas
 

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/op...-87492277.html

They don't discuss the subject too openly outside their own circles, but environmentalists make crystal clear on their Web sites that they want to stop all coal-based power production in this country. They claim coal can never be made clean, so it must be eliminated before it's too late to do anything about global warming. Ted Nace puts it succinctly in a Grist Web site post: "The stakes, for all life on the planet, surpass those of any previous crisis."

That may sound extreme, but Nace is merely expressing mainstream environmentalist thinking. The Sierra Club, for example, tracks the status of all coal-fired power plants in this country on its "Stop the Coal Rush" page. The environmentalists have been remarkably successful in preventing construction of new coal-fired power plants, with 126 having been stopped since 2001, according to the Sierra Club data. And Nace crows that not a single one was started in 2009. Even so, nearly half of all electricity used in the United States is generated by coal-fired power plants, down from a high of 57 percent in 1987.

Regardless of whether one agrees with the goal of eliminating coal-fired power production, it is critically important that policymakers and voters alike understand the duplicitous game being played on them by environmentalists. It is seen most vividly when environmentalists talk about how they plan to replace coal with an array of "green" alternative energy sources, including biomass, solar, wind and ethanol.

What they don't want to talk about is the fact that there's no way those sources are going to replace coal-fired power production by 2030. And they don't want to talk about the fact that there's another extraordinarily plentiful and much cleaner energy source — natural gas — that can readily replace coal and lower energy costs more effectively than any alternative source. In fact, the same environmentalists who are shutting down coal plants are also opposing increased natural gas production. In other words, it's their green way, or nothing.

President Obama and Ken Salazar, his Interior Department secretary, are following right along with the environmentalist playbook on these matters. Salazar recently announced that his department will issue no permits for off-shore natural gas exploration and production before 2012, at the earliest, even though experts agree there are trillions of cubic feet of natural gas waiting to be harvested.

Salazar thus short-circuits the 2008 lifting of presidential and congressional bans on such activities. That means no new off-shore energy development will be approved during Obama's first term in the White House. Meanwhile, Obama is showering billions of tax dollars on alternative energy resources that the Energy Department says won't even be close to replacing coal by 2030.

Yes, we'll be paying taxes on things that most don't want and on things that won't even start for years. Thi is how states go bankrupt.

I'm sorry but coal isn't clean and we need alternatives. There's only so much coal to burn.

OK but what viable alternative is there (right now?)

nuclear + natural gas + wind + solar + hydro + geothermal

probably won't get us completely off coal, but can vastly reduce its use (see Japan, France, and other nations which don't rely on it).

There are of course problem with those energy sources, but unlike with coal those problems are relatively easy to deal with. Even nuclear waste is easier to deal with than belching smoke laced with poisonous gases, heavy metals and radiation into the atmosphere.

Regardless of whether or not GCC is a problem and one that we can deal with, long term burning dead dinosaurs is a completely unsustainable energy source. The sooner we develop alternatives, the better off we'll be long term.

Go to a deserted island so you won't have to pay taxes.

Now all we have to do is get the greenies to agree to nuclear and natural gas, hydro all the others listed are far from viable and are extremely expensive we are just at a point where technology hasn't caught up to the current demands of some people.

But we have guys like obama that think cap and trade would help all it does is tax the polluters and the same amount of pollution is still being omitted.



Now all we have to do is get the greenies to agree to nuclear and natural gas all the others listed are far from viable and are extremely expensive , we are just at a point where technology hasn't caught up to the current demands of some people.

But we have guys like obama that think cap and trade would help all it does is tax the polluters and the same amount of pollution is still being omitted.

And they will but the time isn't now but we have some people that want to cash in on that lack of technology.

Exactly. The U.S. is in a relatively unique situation in that we have a large and diverse enough range of territory we can implement almost every possible alternative energy in different locations. We can path together a more efficient and less turbulent energy grid. We won't be so susceptible to sudden issues in the development of a specific fuel source like oil. And better yet we can tell the Middle East to go **** themselves.

Cap and trade isn't going anywhere and everybody knows it. No need to throw it up there as some bogeyman. It's just not going to happen. Nobody will agree to it.

If the time isn't now then when? These technologies won't pop up out of nowhere if we don't put the money into them now.

If we don't do it then somebody else will and we'll pay the marked up price for the technology.

The hot air You, Barryr, SA, bpc and a few select others constantly spew could be used in lieu of geothermal/ natural gas.

Nuclear, wind, solar and tidal could also be used as an alternative to coal and oil.

When technology catches up (and it will)

Almost all of those listed are used in other parts of the world economically. For example, Iceland runs its entire energy infrastructure on geothermal. Each of those sources is viable in different parts of the world. The American west has an abundance of desert land with which to implement solar technology (so do urban areas -- roofs are a great place for solar panels). The mountain states have an abundance of wind. The coastal states have ready access to hydro power.

Homes in many parts of the world can be heated substantially via geothermal power sources.

Nuclear can be used anywhere where a natural source of energy is not readily available or sufficient.

More to the point, the only way it will *become* economical is if we commit to doing it. After all, necessity is the mother of all invention. And make no mistake, it is necessary. One day (probably sooner rather than later) the oil and coal will run out or cease to meet the scale of our energy needs. We'd best be prepared for that eventuality.

Not that I agree with C&T, but are you really going to argue that charging people money to do something isn't an incentive to do that thing less?

Bronxie is of the belief that manmade global warming is just a big scam designed to make carbon traders rich.

And usher in a left-wing totalitarian world government to boot.

Technology will just "catch up" without people (read: major corporations) being motivated to do R&D?

Do you have any idea how the world works?

Most of the "R" (research) has been done, it's the "D" development which is being fought "tooth and nail". Wouldn't want to loose the "easy money" until they have to, regardless of the damage fossil fuels do to the enviroment.

I guess all hope is lost them right? is that your platform?

What mental misfire led you to derive that conclusion from what I've wrote?

Sorry i totally ****ed that one up can you forgive me?

Ha! :yep:

wow.

We have coal to burn for 200 years. Cleanly.

It will still make CO2 unless we can trap underground or in the ocean.

How amusing. Not only is Iceland broke due to wall street, they live on the mid-atlantic divide.

i.e., Geothermal is easy.

Their population is less than S. Cal.

The difficult choices. How do you Apocalyptos plan to provide power to the masses today if we stopped the use of all fossil fuels?

That's the bloody point. Energy produced from locally available sources is used economically. Iceland is lucky that they have abundant geothermal energy to tap into, but other parts of the world have other natural energy sources available to them as well (as I already listed).

However, if you want to talk about geothermal energy and it's feasibility, let's do so. That you mention Iceland being on the mid-atlantic divide makes it pretty clear you don't understand geothermal energy and think it's only usable (or "easy") where the heat source is highly concentrated.

That's simply not true. Geothermal energy can be used easily and economically in many parts of the U.S. and the world. Anywhere that has temperatures that don't often get below 10 degrees F can make use of geothermal heating for homes (and even places that get below 10F often can supplement their energy needs). No matter what the ambient atmospheric temperature is, the underground temperature is a consistent and reliable energy sink that can be efficiently and cheaply used to heat (or cool) a home. Mind you this is not "theoretical", it's already in use.

If you're actually interested in learning about this, you can start by Googling "Geothermal Heat Pump"

Can it, on it's own, completely remove our dependence on burning dead dinos, environmentally disastrous mining techniques and the middle east? Of course not. Could it move us significantly toward that goal while being economical? Certainly.

Who's advocating the immediate termination of the use of fossil fuels?

The core problem is the resistance to do anything which will gradually reduce our dependance on fossil fuels as long as the energy firms can still profit from their use.