[RayChuang88]

Actually, the issue from coal-fired power plants is NOT CO2, but a long, long list of other immediately harmful pollutants like oxides of nitrogen, soot, sulfur dioxide and heavy metals. That's why there has been more than one episode of essentially lethal bouts of air pollution caused by a combination of too much coal-burning and a perfect temperature inversion situation trapping the air pollutants (London 1952, St. Louis, MO 1939, and Shanghai/Harbin in China 2013).

By applying modern emissions control technology, we've gotten rid of the pollutants I mentioned; China needs to apply these controls to their many coal-fired power plants in order to clean up the air in their cities.

[rktman]

I lived in the UK in the early 60’s and remember one especially nasty winter where the freezing fog hung on for days and all the coal soot interlaced in it certainly caused some issues for folks with respiratory problems. We used coal to heat our house. Much like my mom’s folks did in a small town in Pennsylvania. I remember the coal chute in to the basement.