Energy Secretary Chu Endorses "Clean Coal"

DesScorp writes "The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Energy Secretary Steven Chu is endorsing 'clean coal' technology and research, and is taking a pragmatic approach to coal as an energy supply. '"It absolutely is worthwhile to invest in carbon capture and storage because we are not in a vacuum," Mr. Chu told reporters Tuesday following an appearance at an Energy Information Administration conference. "Even if the United States or Europe turns its back on coal, India and China will not," he said. Mr. Chu added that "quite frankly I doubt if the United States will turn its back on coal. We are generating over 50% of our electrical energy from coal."' The United States has the world's largest reserves of coal. Secretary Chu has reversed his positions on coal and nuclear power, previously opposing them, and once calling coal 'My worst nightmare.'"

Comments

Global warming

[mangu]

what is so bad about trying to produce cleaner coal for electricity generation?

In one formula, CO2. Coal is the fuel that produces more CO2 per joule than any other energy source.

Re:Global warming

[Tyr.1358]

Absolutely right. CO2 is the one chemical that can't seem to be scrubbed out. I work for Babcock Power, and I can tell you that Alcoa Is working with us on some technology to handle that. But the guys I know working in that department say that the technology is at least 7 years away. Management won't task more of us on the project either. We sell systems that we can guarantee will remove 98% of mercury, several SOX, carbon, sulfur and Sulphuric Acid, aluminum, but not CO2. It's the one thing left coming out of smoke stacks in america. I love how we sell 90 of these things every year but people keep complaining that there is no clean coal. After we get rid of the CO2 I swear I expect them to complain about the water vapor next. And no that was not a joke. I would like to point out that the real problem is in how the government classifies a station as "clean". Lets say that power company a has 30 stations. They each generate "points" on a point system developed by the feds. There is a chart that says they must have a certain number of points, depending on the number of stations, that will qualify them to be clean. These companies will invest in our systems to the minimum extent possible to qualify, and then leave the other stations dirty. It is usually less than half of their systems. There is so much I could tell you guys, I had no idea you were interested in clean power. I thought this was a technology site, but I guess it is more broad than that. BTW those wikipedia articles are almost completely wrong, the systems I am working on don't work anything like how they describe, not even close. The ones from our competitors don't work that way either. If those articles are what slashdot is basing it's opinions on I can understand why there is so much confusion. The funny thing is that we are based in MA, and we are selling more of these in the middle east than we are here in the US. They pay us in gold. Real gold. They have so much money floating around over there that they can invest in hundreds of these systems every year, and that is where the real innovation is happening. The power industry in India far outpaces our own, it's actually amazing how much work they have done in the last two decades. If the point system went away, if a legislator grew the balls to do it that is, then all of the power grid in america could be clean within 5 years. The problem is they don't have to buy any more than they need to qualify for the tax credit. That is equivalent to Toyota only putting in enough seat belts to qualify for a tax credit, instead of putting them in every seat because it is the right thing to do.