America to the World: Drop Dead, We Have Coal.
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto 
on 05.29.07
What is going on in America? We have a worldwide CO2 global warming crisis and American politicians are running around trying to throw money at coal-to-liquid production that as the graph shows, does nothing to reduce carbon emissions IF they can figure out how to sequester the CO2 and over DOUBLES if there is no sequestration. It is sacrificing the climate for, as Jim Kunstler says, the "happy motoring culture": Let the rest of the world drown, we will slice off every mountaintop and dig every hole to keep doing things the way we do now.
But GE's lump of coal with legs can only dance so fast- nobody has done carbon sequestration on a massive scale, and even if it works it is like methadone for heroin, substituting one addiction for another.
From the Times:
“This is the snake oil of energy alternatives,” said Peter Altman, a policy analyst at the National Environmental Trust, an environmental advocacy group. “The promises are just as lofty and the substance is just as absent as the first snake oil salesmen who plied their trade in the 1800s.”
Coal executives contend that the technology for converting coal to “ultraclean” diesel fuel for use in cars and trucks has been around for decades. Known as the Fischer-Tropsch process, the technology dates to the 1920s. It was used by Germany during World War II and by South Africa during the apartheid era, in both cases because the countries were blocked by international embargoes from buying oil.
SASOL, a South African chemical conglomerate, is the world’s largest producer of coal-based liquids and operates a plant that produces 150,000 barrels a day.
“Greener and cleaner — we can do it, and we will do it,” said John Baardson, president of Baard Energy, a firm in Vancouver, Wash., that is trying to build a $4 billion coal-to-liquid plant in Ohio.
But no company has built a commercial-scale plant that also captures carbon, and experts caution that many obstacles lie ahead.
“At best, you’re going to tread water on the carbon issue, and you’re probably going to do worse,” said Howard Herzog, a principal research engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a co-author of “The Future of Coal,” a voluminous study published in March by M.I.T. “It goes against the whole grain of reducing carbon.” ::New York Times
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"What is going on in America?"
Simple: many americans are ignorant enough to vote for Bush, fat enough to require a SUV for transportation, stupid enough to care more about Lopez' titty/your next topmodel/creationism, lazy enough not to even consider using a bicycle to drive to work and arrogant/aggressive enough to invade soevereign nations on the other side of the globe. Oh and you guys don't have a proper water supply and need to buy bottled water, also from the other side of the globe.
So, knowing this, does it really surprise you the american energy policy is just as ignorant/stupid/lazy/arrogant? Or was the question a rhetorical one to begin with?;-)
Bad news. China has lots of coal too.
For sequestration to work, it has to be done large scale, at the pit mouth, so to speak, at the utilities. It's going to involve energy expense, driving the cost of energy up even further.
Perhaps the real impetus to getting environmentalism and energy conservation going. in the US is fiscal prudence. Point out to people that the less we use, the longer it lasts.
That and moralism. Americans swing wildly from hedonism to evangelism because they're looking to fill a hole in their lives.
if they showed regard for anyone but themselves they wouldn't be "American" now would they?
(well some of them care)
Are these people that are trying to go ahead with this process going to succeed? I know that the vast majority of people are uneducated on such subjects, and as long as it saves them money in the short-term they will support it. Are there enough sensible folk to stop others from moving in the wrong direction on an issue so dire? What can be done? Or, more immediately, what can I do as a single person?
Certainly, the environmental benefits of CTL are nil at best, and obviously, this being TreeHugger, that's going to be the key topic. But there's many reasons for the US to wean itself from petroleum besides the environment. Our dependence on the middle east for energy supplies is a pretty big one in many people's minds, and an especially easy sell, in this time where people equate the war in Iraq with high gas prices.
Not that I'm saying it's the best idea, but I'm for almost anything that:
a) Gets people talking about solutions.
b) Gets people believing that the US has the ability to provide said solutions.
Democratic primary voters beware, Barrak Obama is a HUGE supporter of this crap.
I think you're spot on in your analysis of the technical problem, but wrong in who you point the finger at. It's not US politicians, it's us, the citizens. We just don't care enough.
We don't care enough to send people to congress who will make a difference and we don't care enough to make small changes in our own lives. That has to be addressed first.
The bigger problem is that politicians are practically falling over themselves to support up to 6 coal-to-liquid plants, which cost about $3B each. Coal is abundant and the lobby is strong--it sounds like many of the politicians have been purchased on the issue already.
Another issue - why subsidize this stuff? People harp on solar and wind because of the subsidy stuff, but if coal is so cheap and abundant, why subsidize the process. What do we have to gain by doing it? Independence from the middle east? What's the opportunity cost of subsidizing this technology? Why not put the money into technology that we know will be clean?
I realize that some of the above comments are said tongue-in-cheek. But do realize that while 1/2 the country voted for Bush, 1/2 the country did not. Not all Americans are ignorant, just most of us.
Seriously, the holier-than-thou attitude of many Europeans/other non-Americans is a bit tiresome. There are milliions of environmentally conscious Americans that are taking appropriate steps to support our environment. If half the country leans one way, that's still 150 million people leaning the other way.
Where is the outcry against China..the disaster waiting to happen? Where is the outcry against what they are doing in Darfur and to the environment? Oh yeah, they're not American.
Also, the vast majority of Americans don't have to buy bottled water (zmc, you are very wrong with that comment)...they're just ignorant and do it anyway. That's a huge problem.
What we can do is call congress and demand that they do not pass any synfuel bill.
(202) 224 3121
It is mostly the Republican Senators who have been bought by coal and oil, so elect more Democrats, environmental ones next time. If we had a Democratic majority in the Senate, this would not pass.
To getmore involved in swinging elections to Democrats with a clue on CO2, read and write at dailykos, you'll gradually realise how to get activated in your neighbourhood.
http://www.dailykos.com
Obama is a mixed bag: has recently switched from supporting the Lieberman MCain global warming bill (with nukes), to the real deal - The Boxer bill that The Union of Concerned Scientists says we need to get CO2 80% below 1990 by 2050.
He also supports a bill to subsidise electric cars and hybrids, to get us off gas.
But he buys that crap on synfuels. Call and tell him NO!
do not worry
Italy do the same, probably worst.
hate to think it, but the sea level is going to have to raise before they understand.