Environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. lit into President Obama’s support of “clean coal” yesterday, calling the president a “great man” but also an “indentured servant” of the coal industry.
Obama has proposed $3.4 billion for further research on clean coal projects. The theory of “clean coal” is that the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, which is released into the atmosphere when coal is burned, can be captured. Billions of dollars have been spent in the past 24 years to find a way to make the clean coal dream come true, but so far there are still no plants operating using any such technology. Former VP Al Gore has been particularly dismissive of the idea of clean coal, and at last year’s Clinton Global Initiative, said, “How many such plants are there? Zero. How many blueprints? Zero.” Kennedy and Gore are joined in the anti-clean coal movement by the filmmaking Coen Brothers who have produced a couple of funny commercials on the subject; see one of them here:
This article appears in Apr 21-28, 2009.
‘It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.’
— Aristotle
‘A weak mind is like a microscope, which magnifies trifling things but cannot receive great ones.’
— G. K. Chesterton
‘I had an immense advantage over many others dealing with the problem in as much as I had no fixed ideas derived from long-established practice to control and bias my mind, and did not suffer from the general belief that whatever is, is right.’
— Henry Bessemer
‘We all operate in two contrasting modes, which might be called open and closed. The open mode is more relaxed, more receptive, more exploratory, more democratic, more playful and more humorous. The closed mode is the tighter, more rigid, more hierarchical, more tunnel-visioned. Most people, unfortunately spend most of their time in the closed mode.’
— John Cleese
The use of sophisticated software systems for coal mining that is mostly burnt for power generation and steel production and adds to the greenhouse effect is valid for western countries who may allocate resources and funds to alternative and more greener sources of power. Some of the alternatives may be “safer” than the traditional mines. Unfortunately, coal publications show developing economies are more likely to increase their use of thermal coal & metallurgical coal in coming years because of its affordability and to meet increasing demands for electricity and steel. Whether they will embrace and utilise sophisticated software systems that no doubt add to the cost of production is yet to be seen. Cherry of http://www.coalportal.com