Coal Power Online

J S asked:


By 2012, the plants in three key countries - China, India, and the United States - are expected to emit as much as an extra 2.7 billion tons of carbon dioxide, according to a Monitor analysis of power-plant construction data. In contrast, Kyoto countries by that year are supposed to have cut their CO2 emissions by some 483 million tons.

The findings suggest that critics of the treaty, including the Bush administration, may be correct when they claim the treaty is hopelessly flawed because it doesn’t limit emissions from the developing world. But they also suggest that the world is on the cusp of creating a huge new infrastructure that will pump out enormous amounts of CO2 for the next six decades.

“If all those power plants are online by 2012, then obviously it completely cancels out any gains from Kyoto,” says Gavin Schmidt, a climate modeler with the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, part of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
http://www.mnforsustain.org/climate_change_kyoto_accords_vs_more_coal_plants_csmonitor.htm

Why pretend that a new tax will reduce carbon emissions when we’re clearly building enough new power plants to miss the goals proposed to justify the tax?

Why even discuss a new tax when its goal of reducing global warming cannot be reached without China and India joining emission reduction talks?
It’s fascinating that after 24 hours not one of the folks who commonly defend AGW theory has any defense of the proposed taxes (myself included).

So are the claims that “it’s all about taxation” essentially correct? How else can we explain massive proposed taxes that will clearly be ineffective?

Amy L asked:


http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/coalpower/peer-review/2007/APS%20Peer%20Review%20Meeting_Panelist%20Bios%20for%20Binder_071207.pdf
http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/coalpower/futuregen/index.html

Gristmill waded through a 70-some page GAO report and pulled out this paragraph to express their concerns:

The “DOE and industry have not demonstrated the technological feasibility of the long-term storage of carbon dioxide captured by a large-scale, coal-based power plant,” according to a December 2006 GAO report.

http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d07106.pdf
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/2/14286/68801

Your thoughts? I’ll share some of mine a bit later.

Rationality Personified asked:


If you had to choose between getting your electric power from an existing coal-burning power plant 100 miles (160 km) away from your home or having a new nuclear power plant built within 5 miles (8 km) of your home, which would you choose and why? Don’t forget the resistive power losses that occur in power transmission lines, causing power to be wasted the farther the power plant is from the customer.

Stan S asked:


http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/03/70393
http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2006/03/70405

This article only adds weight to that conclusion

G2 asked:


Politicians are refusing to allow utility companies to build coal fired power plants due to the greenhouse gas scare. If they have to build natural gas fired electrical generation plants, won’t the fuel cost double?