Coal generation drops nearly 20% in past year.

[Willinois]

Good news from Climate Progress. Coal's share of the U.S. energy generation has been shrinking steadily since the days when it was more than half. This year it dropped more dramatically to 36% in the first quarter of this year.

Quote:The U.S. coal industry if facing major headwinds. The current drop in generation is mostly due to competition from natural gas. But there are other factors that will assist in pushing coal out of the electricity mix: An aging fleet of plants, cost-competitive renewables, new clean air regulations, and a strong anti-coal movement are working together to reduce the attractiveness of coal. Since 2010, plant operators have announced 106 retirements of coal facilities — representing 13 percent of the U.S. fleet, according to the Sierra Club.

The continued decline in domestic coal generation is good news for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon dioxide emissions from the fossil fuel sector are expected to decline by almost 3 percent this year — continuing the 1.9 percent decrease seen in 2011. Emissions from natural gas will rise by 5.5 percent, while emissions from coal will fall by almost 12 percent.

[sandnsea]

Unfortunately they are still mining it, just shipping it offshore. Oregon is about to have a big old schoolyard fight with Montana. I have not read about the specific plants that the coal is proposed to be shipped to so I don't know whether they are newer, cleaner plants or not - or how much cleaner than our old northeastern plants they are. I know you're against all coal, but as I've said before, we currently have to choose between coal power and natural gas. The production of one seems as bad as the other to me.

[Willinois]

The blog mentions that US coal mining is on the decline as well. There are infrastructure limits to how much can be physically shipped out of the country at once. New coal ports and railways are being fought at the same time, which will continue to limit how much can be exported.

It's easy to measure that natural gas has much lower levels of air pollution than coal. It produces roughly half the pollution that causes climate change.

Fracking is a huge problem because Bush allowed it to start with no regulation at all. That needs to be corrected. But so far, I haven't seen evidence that even unregulated fracking has caused anywhere near as much devastation as certain coal mining methods that are still legal.

There are large portions of several Illinois counties that are depopulated now because of longwall mining. A new strip mine is proposed in Illinois next to a lake that supplies drinking water to tens of thousands of people. It's inevitable that their water supply will be poisoned. Those communities can't get people to pay attention to what's happening. It's not the hot topic like fracking.

And that doesn't even address the hypocrisy of New York and Pennsylvania communities fighting fracking while they currently get their power from coal plants using mountaintop removal coal, which is dramatically more damaging than fracking. They're pushing the costs of their power usage down the ladder to poor mountain communities.

[sandnsea]

(05-14-2012 08:47 PM)Willinois Wrote:  The blog mentions that US coal mining is on the decline as well. There are infrastructure limits to how much can be physically shipped out of the country at once. New coal ports and railways are being fought at the same time, which will continue to limit how much can be exported.

It's easy to measure that natural gas has much lower levels of air pollution than coal. It produces roughly half the pollution that causes climate change.

Fracking is a huge problem because Bush allowed it to start with no regulation at all. That needs to be corrected. But so far, I haven't seen evidence that even unregulated fracking has caused anywhere near as much devastation as certain coal mining methods that are still legal.

There are large portions of several Illinois counties that are depopulated now because of longwall mining. A new strip mine is proposed in Illinois next to a lake that supplies drinking water to tens of thousands of people. It's inevitable that their water supply will be poisoned. Those communities can't get people to pay attention to what's happening. It's not the hot topic like fracking.

And that doesn't even address the hypocrisy of New York and Pennsylvania communities fighting fracking while they currently get their power from coal plants using mountaintop removal coal, which is dramatically more damaging than fracking. They're pushing the costs of their power usage down the ladder to poor mountain communities.

I disagree that fracking is significantly better than mountaintop removal. I think coal mining in Montana is better than the Appalachians, I know the coal is a different grade that burns cleaner.

This goes back to the question I asked some time ago. On the scale of environmental damage, which is worse overall. Fracking in Canada and piping the natural gas to Oklahoma or Louisiana isn't any worse than fracking in PA.

[Willinois]

(05-14-2012 09:26 PM)sandnsea Wrote:  I disagree that fracking is significantly better than mountaintop removal.

In terms of annual deaths and unrepairable ecological damage, it's not even a close call.

Again, I think its important that fracking be regulated. Then most of the horror stories can be avoided. In contrast, there's no way to blow up a mountain, or strip mine next to someone's water supply, that isn't a horror story.

[Willinois]

But to be more positive, wind and solar are also growing rapidly. The blog quote gives the impression that all the coal is being replaced with natural gas. That's not true. Renewable energy is replacing a significant portion and that's only going to get better as new wind and solar projects keep going online.

[Willinois]

Mountaintop Removal Linked to 60,000 Additional Cancer Cases

Plus horrible birth defect rates in mining communities. Plus mining accident deaths.

The focus needs to be on building more renewables but no one has shown fracking causing problems on anywhere near the scale of mountaintop removal.

[sandnsea]

(05-14-2012 09:41 PM)Willinois Wrote:  Mountaintop Removal Linked to 60,000 Additional Cancer Cases

Plus horrible birth defect rates in mining communities. Plus mining accident deaths.

The focus needs to be on building more renewables but no one has shown fracking causing problems on anywhere near the scale of mountaintop removal.

Then it would seem to me that Keystone is fine, and that whatever solution there is to make fracking safer needs to be the focus.

Nobody needs to explain to me the damage from coal mining. Remember I lived in Montana for 15 years and saw the damage of Butte coal mining first hand. The funny thing is Montana was one of the first states to stop a proposed fracking project about ten years ago. But the ugly part of the state, nobody cares. There is the matter of the coal having less sulphur than Chinese coal, is that an important consideration at all?

I don't disagree that we need 100% clean wind and solar energy. But it's hard to convince someone to wait for the technology when they have a family to feed today. That's Brian Schweitzer's argument too and I well remember how many people thought he was the answer to the Democrat's prayers.

I still think we have to prioritize and advocate answers, if there are some, instead of just protesting all the time.

[Willinois]

(05-15-2012 03:26 PM)sandnsea Wrote:  

(05-14-2012 09:41 PM)Willinois Wrote:  Mountaintop Removal Linked to 60,000 Additional Cancer Cases

Plus horrible birth defect rates in mining communities. Plus mining accident deaths.

The focus needs to be on building more renewables but no one has shown fracking causing problems on anywhere near the scale of mountaintop removal.

Then it would seem to me that Keystone is fine, and that whatever solution there is to make fracking safer needs to be the focus.

Keystone XL is for oil, not electricity generation. I don't understand why you're making a connection between that and fracking.

Most Powder River Basin coal from MT/WY is used in the united states in power plants that are avoiding installing sulfur controls. For example, even though IL is a coal state, over 90% of the coal burned in IL plants is imported from out of state because IL has high sulfur coal. IL coal plant operators would rather import coal than spend the money to install pollution controls. Illinois coal is then shipped to plants with sulfur controls or to places with weak environmental regulation like China and Alabama.

We don't have to wait for technology. We have a political problem, not a technological problem. And part of the solution is taking old coal plants offline to make room in the market for new wind and solar generation. America has a lot of excess generating capacity which means wind and solar are at a disadvantage as long as they're competing with the old coal plants with no pollution controls.

If I had my wish, the top priorities would be:
1) Fast and strict implementation of EPA rules related to coal that Obama is proposing.
2) Regulate fracking. I think some natural gas use will always be necessary as a complement to wind. Coal and nuclear can't fire up and down quickly enough to respond to wind's variability. That's not popular but I haven't heard anyone propose a better alternative that won't result in rolling brownouts when wind and solar output is low.
3) Keep the renewable energy tax credits and loan guarantees so we can build new clean energy fast.

That should keep the lights on and deal with climate change without requiring Congress to pass a big energy bill. It will also create far more jobs than Keystone XL or the coal industry.

[sandnsea]

(05-15-2012 06:05 PM)Willinois Wrote:  Keystone XL is for oil, not electricity generation. I don't understand why you're making a connection between that and fracking.

Most Powder River Basin coal from MT/WY is used in the united states in power plants that are avoiding installing sulfur controls. For example, even though IL is a coal state, over 90% of the coal burned in IL plants is imported from out of state because IL has high sulfur coal. IL coal plant operators would rather import coal than spend the money to install pollution controls. Illinois coal is then shipped to plants with sulfur controls or to places with weak environmental regulation like China and Alabama.

We don't have to wait for technology. We have a political problem, not a technological problem. And part of the solution is taking old coal plants offline to make room in the market for new wind and solar generation. America has a lot of excess generating capacity which means wind and solar are at a disadvantage as long as they're competing with the old coal plants with no pollution controls.

If I had my wish, the top priorities would be:
1) Fast and strict implementation of EPA rules related to coal that Obama is proposing.
2) Regulate fracking. I think some natural gas use will always be necessary as a complement to wind. Coal and nuclear can't fire up and down quickly enough to respond to wind's variability. That's not popular but I haven't heard anyone propose a better alternative that won't result in rolling brownouts when wind and solar output is low.
3) Keep the renewable energy tax credits and loan guarantees so we can build new clean energy fast.

That should keep the lights on and deal with climate change without requiring Congress to pass a big energy bill. It will also create far more jobs than Keystone XL or the coal industry.

I mention the tar sands because they use similar technology to get that oil and it is an environmental nightmare in Canada. If we encourage electric cars so we don't have to drill for oil, then we're back to talking about coal to meet the increased electric needs. If electric goes too high, then people start looking to natural gas.

It all goes together.

Yes, there are times wind & solar generate excess power. Bonneville doesn't want to pay for the excess eletricity generated in Oregon, which would put the wind farms out of business. I'm very aware of what is going on.

If natural gas is the cleaner energy source, then how do we get it out of the ground without fracking? There's natural gas on Alaska's North Slope. If we can get it without fracking, maybe we should.

What about this article? Maybe there can be clean coal, aside from the environmental nightmare of mining it?

"Some of the low-to-medium-sulfur coals can be cleaned by this process to less than the 1.2-pounds-of-SO2-per-million-Btu level mandated by the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments and, hence, can be burned without using costly scrubbers."

http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/vtpubs/spectru...29/3c.html

We still need solar shingles and a solar hot water heater in every house. We're not serious until we get that done.

[Willinois]

(05-15-2012 07:52 PM)sandnsea Wrote:  What about this article? Maybe there can be clean coal, aside from the environmental nightmare of mining it?

"Some of the low-to-medium-sulfur coals can be cleaned by this process to less than the 1.2-pounds-of-SO2-per-million-Btu level mandated by the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments and, hence, can be burned without using costly scrubbers."

That's one pollutant. But, if you use all the technologies to make a modern "clean" coal facility it becomes the most expensive energy on the market, by far. So, there's not much point when there are several cheaper and cleaner alternatives That's why many coal plants will shut down rather than upgrade over the next 10 years.

[Willinois]

(05-15-2012 07:52 PM)sandnsea Wrote:  Yes, there are times wind & solar generate excess power. Bonneville doesn't want to pay for the excess eletricity generated in Oregon, which would put the wind farms out of business. I'm very aware of what is going on.

Responding to everything you wrote would have taken forever but this is an issue that still irks me. Wind and solar aren't producing excess power. The entire generating system is at certain times. It's just wind and solar that Bonneville wants to selectively not pay for instead of powering down their other generating plants. Bonneville is being ridiculous about fighting wind.

Wind and solar are the fastest growing power sources. The grid needs to be updated to respond to their fluctuations and we'll also need a complimentary power source that can power up and down more quickly than coal or nuclear.

[Leaning Right]

(05-14-2012 09:41 PM)Willinois Wrote:  Plus horrible birth defect rates in mining communities. Plus mining accident deaths.

The focus needs to be on building more renewables but no one has shown fracking causing problems on anywhere near the scale of mountaintop removal.

Mountaintop removal is ugly.

I looked at your link addressing cancer deaths, but as far as I can find in the medical research industry - coal is not a known carcinogen. Inhaling coal dust, however, is a known factor in the increased risk of developing black lung.
http://www.webmd.com/lung/tc/black-lung-...c-overview

Renewable energy research is nice and should continue. Until then, coal is one of the least expensive forms of energy and EPA regulations ensure that it's now one of the cleanest. Clean coal is not as expensive to produce than energy from natural gas and wind generation.

Plus, the energy grid cannot store excess energy, fuel cell storage is just not feasible at present - so a calm day means no energy if we're soley dependent upon wind. The same holds true for a cloudy day and solar power.

Luckily, there are new energy studies in the mix and we can all look forward to cleaner energy and a cleaner planet.

[Willinois]

(06-08-2012 05:53 AM)Leaning Right Wrote:  

(05-14-2012 09:41 PM)Willinois Wrote:  Plus horrible birth defect rates in mining communities. Plus mining accident deaths.

The focus needs to be on building more renewables but no one has shown fracking causing problems on anywhere near the scale of mountaintop removal.

Mountaintop removal is ugly.

I looked at your link addressing cancer deaths, but as far as I can find in the medical research industry - coal is not a known carcinogen. Inhaling coal dust, however, is a known factor in the increased risk of developing black lung.
http://www.webmd.com/lung/tc/black-lung-...c-overview

Renewable energy research is nice and should continue. Until then, coal is one of the least expensive forms of energy and EPA regulations ensure that it's now one of the cleanest. Clean coal is not as expensive to produce than energy from natural gas and wind generation.

Plus, the energy grid cannot store excess energy, fuel cell storage is just not feasible at present - so a calm day means no energy if we're soley dependent upon wind. The same holds true for a cloudy day and solar power.

Luckily, there are new energy studies in the mix and we can all look forward to cleaner energy and a cleaner planet.

Almost nothing you wrote here is factually correct.

Even the link I posted was a medical study. It's hard to understand how you could read the article and still claim that coal isn't a carcinogen. Coal ash waste is full of carcinogens. Coal mines routinely pollute water with carcinogens. This information is not difficult to find.
Start here: http://www.psr.org/resources/coal-ash-th...nment.html

Many coal power plants have been grandfathered in and are therefore not forced to meet EPA requirements. Obama is changing that but it's only just beginning after years of weak enforcement. To suggest that EPA regulations already make coal plants clean is absurd. Air pollution from coal power plants, besides being the #1 source of man made climate change pollution, kills tens of thousands of people a year from respiratory disease and other health impacts. Most older coal plants have still not been forced to install modern pollution controls.

So-called clean coal would produce the most expensive energy on the market. More expensive than wind or natural gas. That's why new clean coal projects are being abandoned left and right. Even with government subsidies, they can't compete in the market.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-...sification

It's also why coal companies are shutting down small coal plants rather than update them with new pollution controls. It's not economically viable for them to comply with new regulations proposed by Obama's EPA.
http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/a...438dc.html

You wrote: "a calm day means no energy if we're soley dependent upon wind."
That's why no one is proposing we rely solely upon wind. That's a straw man argument made by the coal industry. Wind will be part of the energy mix. And when the wind is still in one part of the grid, then the wind will be blowing somewhere else at another wind farm. Energy is routinely transferred from one place to another. The grid is being updated to facilitate that and more needs to be done. We don't have to wait around for storage technology before building more wind and solar.
Also, solar produces the most on hot, summer days when the wind is still. It ramps up just when wind is producing the least, so they compliment each other well.

[Leaning Right]

(06-08-2012 11:19 AM)Willinois Wrote:  Almost nothing you wrote here is factually correct.

Even the link I posted was a medical study. It's hard to understand how you could read the article and still claim that coal isn't a carcinogen. Coal ash waste is full of carcinogens. Coal mines routinely pollute water with carcinogens. This information is not difficult to find.
Start here: http://www.psr.org/resources/coal-ash-th...nment.html

Maybe I'm looking at the wrong link of yours, but what I'm reading is that "coal ash," not "coal" is thought to be carcinogenic. But see, that's true of nearly ALL ash, including wood ash, stubble ash, etc.

Your link leads to an opinion piece that cites a "self reported" cancer survey in a mountaintop mining community vs. a non-mountaintop mining community. The mining process, itself, does not produce ash - coal ash is a by-product of combustion. The coal is shipped, usually by train, to a plant where is it burned to produce the electrical energy that feeds the grid.

Quote:Many coal power plants have been grandfathered in and are therefore not forced to meet EPA requirements. Obama is changing that but it's only just beginning after years of weak enforcement. To suggest that EPA regulations already make coal plants clean is absurd. Air pollution from coal power plants, besides being the #1 source of man made climate change pollution, kills tens of thousands of people a year from respiratory disease and other health impacts. Most older coal plants have still not been forced to install modern pollution controls.

All plants have to meet EPA regulations - the difference is that plants just being constructed must meet MORE STRINGENT regulations. So, in that, you're correct that older plants are not as safe in their emissions as are the new ones. They are still tested, however, and must comply.

Quote:So-called clean coal would produce the most expensive energy on the market. More expensive than wind or natural gas. That's why new clean coal projects are being abandoned left and right. Even with government subsidies, they can't compete in the market.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-...sification

Somebody is pulling that reporter's leg. Since "clean coal" is a collective term, I guess someone could propose turning into a substance similar to natural gas, but that's not the generally-held definition of the term. Clean coal, in the industry, just means employing the use of water condensation and scrubbers that filter out the toxic emissions in the steam and smoke that result from coal combustion. Read this for an explanation of clean coal:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_coal_technology

Quote:It's also why coal companies are shutting down small coal plants rather than update them with new pollution controls. It's not economically viable for them to comply with new regulations proposed by Obama's EPA.
http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/a...438dc.html

That's correct. The EPA announced new regs to take effect at the end of this year. A number of coal-fired plants are scheduled to go off-line. There is talk, however, that they will be given latitude. Who knows? It's a wait and see on that one.

Quote:That's a straw man argument made by the coal industry. Wind will be part of the energy mix. And when the wind is still in one part of the grid, then the wind will be blowing somewhere else at another wind farm. Energy is routinely transferred from one place to another. The grid is being updated to facilitate that and more needs to be done. We don't have to wait around for storage technology before building more wind and solar.
Also, solar produces the most on hot, summer days when the wind is still. It ramps up just when wind is producing the least, so they compliment each other well.

That sounds nice, but I don't think it's realistic. Wind and solar are a nice addition to the mix, but the cost to the consumers goes up, incrementally, as the ratio of wind/solar to coal-generated energy increases.

I completely support alternative energy research, but I don't want to fool the American public, many of whom already struggle to pay their heating and cooling costs into thinking that the technology already exists to replace coal-fired energy on any widespread scale.

The best route to take, in my opinion, is to enact common-sense regulations that make everyone safer while minimizing utility costs to the average consumer.

[Willinois]

"Maybe I'm looking at the wrong link of yours, but what I'm reading is that "coal ash," not "coal" is thought to be carcinogenic."

And you think this distinction is important to make because...
I'm glad we can agree that using coal as a power sources releases carcinogens into water supplies and gives miners cancer. The chemicals in coal ash that cause cancer don't magically appear from nowhere. Those carcinogens are in the coal itself.
Splitting hairs about the study being "self-reporting" is cute but also irrelevant. I'm not sure why you're so insistent on ignoring studies of elevated cancer rates in mountaintop removal communities, but I'm guessing more links won't dissuade you if you're determined to believe that coal isn't a carcinogen despite the fact that mining it and disposing of it are giving people cancer.

I'm glad we could agree that your previous claim about coal plants being clean because they must comply with EPA regulation is incorrect. Existing plants aren't required to meet new rules until they make a major upgrade. So of course, many plants don't make major upgrades in order to avoid compliance. For anyone interested, here's a good article about why so many coal plants are still very dirty. This is another problem Obama's EPA is fixing and thousands of lives will be saved every year as a result.

Clean coal has meant many things. The industry calls every proposed coal plant clean and every operator of a coal plant in America claims that their plant is clean. For the past 100 years the industry has defined "clean coal" as whatever they're doing at the time. In other words, the term is meaningless and a lie.
A clean coal gasification plant proposed near me is seeking massive government subsidies because it's not financially viable on its own. Here's info about the Illinois Commerce Commission study that showed power generated by the clean coal plant would cost even more than wind power, nuclear or natural gas.
You might also look up FutureGen. It's a far more costly disaster than solyndra. Even with massive government subsidies, clean coal can't be done.

It's unrealistic to expect America to keep getting 1/3 or more of its energy from the deadliest power source in use today. You bring up rates, but the reality is that new coal plants raise rates. The brand new Prairie State coal plant is called clean and communities that invested in it are seeing 15%-30% rate increases as a result of their mistake. Wind power is now cost competitive with new coal.

The only cheap coal is from older, dirty plants that haven't updated their pollution controls. That's only cheap for consumers if you don't include the cost of asthma inhalers, respiratory therapists, and other medical bills associated with cancer, birth defects, cardiovascular disease and learning disabilities caused by coal pollution.

The technology for renewable energy exists today and is ready to go. The barriers are not technological, but rather the political power of the coal industry (along with their power to fool much of the public) is holding America back.

[Leaning Right]

Natural gas, despite its name, is also a carbon fuel.