Winds of Change Newsletter, December 2005     See sidebar for table of contents

Courage to Move Beyond Coal

By Bryan McNeil (excerpts)

Thank goodness a corporation with the size and influence of General Electric has taken on America's antiquated energy policies with investments and innovative plans for developing new energy sources. Corporations increasingly provide needed leadership to push America towards a forward-looking energy policy. That said, GE and others must have the courage to divert much-needed resources away from so-called clean coal technology. Coal simply is not clean and has no place in America's energy mix for the 21st century and beyond.

"Clean" coal technology sounds like a promising endeavor. Reducing smokestack emissions would go a long way towards alleviating the largest source of air pollution in the United States. But "clean" coal suffers from two critical flaws. First, it focuses only on smokestack emissions-one of many sources of pollution coal creates. Second, the politics of coal and energy have already exposed "clean" coal as a political shell game.

"Clean" coal technology works. I have seen it. After several years researching West Virginia's coal mining industry, I visited the coal-fired cogeneration plant at the University of North Carolina, where I attended graduate school. UNC's plant uses a fluidized bed furnace, a model of clean coal technology developed under a federal program from 1986 through 1993. The plant exceeds all federal standards for smokestack emissions. The plant captures over 99 percent of its particulates, 92% of its sulfur, and recycles ash that other plants often dump in landfills. UNC installed its fluidized bed furnace in 1992. In 2005 the public must ask, why hasn't this become the industry standard?

That "clean" coal technology works is completely irrelevant. Resistance to actually use existing technology while continually proclaiming the promise of coal reveals "clean" coal for what it is: a political shell game that funnels money into the pockets of coal and utility companies rather than developing projects that could wean America off of fossil fuels.

The political sleight of hand that is "clean" coal also serves to focus attention on emissions as the only source of coal's pollution Simply put, there is no "clean" way to mine coal.

Even as CEO Jeffery Immelt announced GE's new "ecomagination" project, the company aired an advertisement that is hands-down the most ridiculous thing on television. Sexy models mining coal with picks and shovels offends anyone who has mined coal and misleads viewers on how mining is done.

An underground coal mine is a place unlike any other: an eerie, damp netherworld where proud workers slosh around in ankle-deep muck. In this dimly lit environment filled with opportunities for injury and death, the only skin visible on a miner is that between safety goggles and the chin

The dirtiest secret of the coal industry at the dawn of the 21st century is that an increasing percentage of coal is not mined underground at all. In the Appalachian region, mountaintop removal has become a preferred mining methodMany mountaintop removal sites in southern West Virginia encompass 5,000 contiguous acres, making a mockery of the 1977 Surface Mine Control and Reclamation Act

Clearly, controlling smokestack emissions will do nothing to correct the myriad human and environmental tragedies associated with mountaintop removal. It will not reduce the number of miners suffering from black lung or other chronic disabilities that accompany mining. Clearly, America's dependence on coal will not end suddenly; burning coal still generates over 50% of the nation's electricity. Nevertheless, an intelligent, forward-looking energy policy must be based on weaning the nation off of coal altogether. GE or any other company should be proud to lead efforts at increasing investments in green energy. But so-called clean coal technology simply does not qualify. GE undermines its own efforts by misleading the public about mining coal. GE, industry, government and the United States at large must get real about changing energy policy and accept that nothing about coal is clean, much less sexy.