Posted on 09/27/2014 5:20:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
President Obama, Ban Ki-moon and 300,000 others showed up in New York City this week to support the use of modern technologies and cleaner fuels. But at least four notable heads-of-state stayed home, each of whom is just as important in the battle against global warming. Missing: China, India, Russia and Canada.
While it may seem hard to reconcile that some of the globe’s biggest polluters skipped the event — they still sent delegations as a show of respect — it is not necessarily a blow to the cause. That’s because of unconventional shale gas — and the wealth of those supplies all around the world. The paradox is whether climate activists can possibly embrace natural gas a bridge fuel until greener energies would win greater market acceptance. Possible?
“We should have increasingly stringent regulations on coal to help us move away from it,” says Michael Shellenberger, president of the Breakthrough Institute, an environmental think tank. “Cheap natural gas helps a lot. But we need to ramp up our investments in renewables and nuclear energy so that they can compete with coal and natural gas.”
The Breakthrough Institute is part of the push to crack the climate change code by first ditching coal-fired power and using mostly natural gas and nuclear energy. It’s a far more pragmatic approach to lessening all the pollutants that are regulated under the Clean Air Act — ones that don’t just include carbon dioxide but also sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter. That position on natural gas is, generally, supported by the Worldwatch Institute.
While the United States has the technology to develop such shale gas reserves, the rest of the world has yet to catch up. If ever they do, both China and India have a plethora of unconventional fuel under their feet....
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
I remember when they supported clean coal.
Then when it looked like they were going to get it, they opposed it.
There are only two solutions that enviros embrace:
1. Magical 1x1 ft solar panels that can power a house.
2. Exterminating 90% of the human population.
Of course, they can only make one of those happen.
For those who want to see a video showing how horizontal drilling and fracking is done, Northern Gas and Oil has a great one. It’s 6 minutes.
It includes a visual piece on how fresh water aquifers are protected from contamination.
http://www.northernoil.com/drilling-video
The Church of Warm is funded by the oil arab nations.
Only neocons wNt the U.S. to be energy independent and free of the Middle East.
Actually, what most people think of as "renewables" is under 5%. They only get it to 10% by including hydro, which most enviros also oppose.
I’ve been all over the Baaken. Wish the enviro-nuts could see how fresh and neat and clean it is. The water is gorgeous! Cattle graze around wells and underground pipelines. Some of the most beautiful country I’ve ever seen.
They have goalposts on wheels. We will never reach them.
Are we depleted of anthracite, or are we just not bothering with obtaining that type of coal?
Maybe you can help me here. As I understand it, coal is not prohibited as such, they simply established emission standards that coal can’t meet.
Which means that if someone discovers a method whereby coal can be used and still meet those emission standards, it’s right back in the game, and the inventor will become very, very rich.
Depending of course on the cost of the method for burning coal at low emissions.
Or am I missing something?
I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE!
These people and their ilk aren’t out to save the environment. They are out to destroy capitalism.
In one case here in Michigan they had a clean coal plant in the planning and development stages for a decade. Between the lawsuits to block it, endless permitting processes, and environmental impact studies they spent millions. When there was nothing left to stand in the way when the Granholm administration pulled the permits declaring that a new plant was unneeded.
Less than a month later, Granholm turned around and gave the go ahead for a wind farm and gave them subsidies.
Is it "clean coal" or "cleaner coal?"
Is there any process out there whereby coal can be burned as cleanly as nat gas?
It more a matter of efficient burning so there is little left as waste and the carbon dioxide would be captured.
SO2, SO3, NO, NO2, oxidised HG and particulate matter formed when coal is combusted in a power plant boiler, what you and I would think of as pollutants, can be removed, in series, by various technologies. At that point, coal is less expensive on a BTU basis, and just as 'clean', as natural gas. This is true even in the U.S., where natural gas prices are less than one-third those in the U.S.
If one believes that CO2 emissions cause climate change or global warming and therefore supports the EPA's finding that CO2 is a pollutant, then the net cost of removing and selling the CO2, puts coal at a considerable cost disadvantage to natural gas.
In the absence of a belief in a link between CO2 emissions and climate change or AGW, there is no reason to oppose coal-fired power plants.
.
“in the U.S.” = in the rest of the world
With the natural gas come natural gas liquids and oil, lots of oil. So when the greenies sign on to that bridge fuel natural gas, the champagne of fossil fuels, they are opening the door to oil exploration and production activities, oil revenues and associated economic growth. That, in turn, helps pay for the Left's social programs.
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