Milestone

[FloatingFatMan]

Unfortunatley the amount of sun i get over here in London, i'd be lucky to be able to make one luke warm cup of tea a fortnight!

Modern photo voltaic cells don't require direct sunlight. Daylight is sufficient to generate a charge.

[petrossa]

Just because some PR-wiz managed to get the "Clean Coal" slogan to stick doesn't mean that coal is remotely clean. The best coal-fired plant is still worse than a natural-gas fired plant since Coal generates both smog and acid rain on top of the carbon emissions that you likely don't care about. Coal scrubbers do not prevent air pollution, but they do reduce it by filtering out some of the most harmful pollutants. Even with scrubbers and the tallest smokestacks the best you can hope for is to put the smog higher up in the atmosphere so that it doesn't disperse in your own back yard. That still is hardly responsible.

Scrubbers reducing emissions at coal-fired plant

16 November 2009-- Detroit Edison's 3,000 MW Monroe Power Plant has begun operating two flue gas desulfurization (FGD) systems. The first was activated in June and the second began Nov. 16.

Detroit Edison said sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions are reduced by 97 percent and mercury emissions are reduced 80 to 90 percent from the coal-fired plant's Unit 3. Similar reductions were seen on Unit 4 when the first FGD began operations.

In addition to the scrubbers, selective catalytic reduction (SCR) technology was installed on three of the plant's generating units. The SCR's reportedly cut nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions by 90 percent.

Work is under way for construction of the third and fourth scrubbers and the fourth SCR at the plant. Some of the site work is expected to begin next year.

SOURCE

Modern photo voltaic cells don't require direct sunlight. Daylight is sufficient to generate a charge.

i'll finish your sentence for you FFM:

Daylight is sufficient to generate a charge.....enough to power your pocket calculator. :p

[Fred Derf Veteran]

Scrubbers reducing emissions at coal-fired plant

16 November 2009-- Detroit Edison's 3,000 MW Monroe Power Plant has begun operating two flue gas desulfurization (FGD) systems. The first was activated in June and the second began Nov. 16.

Detroit Edison said sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions are reduced by 97 percent and mercury emissions are reduced 80 to 90 percent from the coal-fired plant's Unit 3. Similar reductions were seen on Unit 4 when the first FGD began operations.

In addition to the scrubbers, selective catalytic reduction (SCR) technology was installed on three of the plant's generating units. The SCR's reportedly cut nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions by 90 percent.

Work is under way for construction of the third and fourth scrubbers and the fourth SCR at the plant. Some of the site work is expected to begin next year.

SOURCE

I'm not suggesting that scrubbers are worse than no scrubbers but coal in an inherently dirty product. Scrubbers used on the smokestacks of coal-fired plants do nothing to reduce the pollution from the coal mining process which is itself dirty.

Previously I said that natural gas was preferable to "clean coal" and I'll stick by that. You can dress up coal as you want but it is still coal. The scrubbers don't take everything out even if they do take out most SO2 and NOx emissions. You are still releasing a lot of 'crap' into the environment.

[petrossa]

Previously I said that natural gas was preferable to "clean coal" and I'll stick by that. You can dress up coal as you want but it is still coal. The scrubbers don't take everything out even if they do take out most SO2 and NOx emissions. You are still releasing a lot of 'crap' into the environment.

True, gas is cleaner than coal. But there's way more coal than gas reserves, and coal is way more cheap and coal fired plants are more reliable than gasturbines

http://www.naturalgas.org/overview/uses_eletrical.asp

[Fred Derf Veteran]

True, gas is cleaner than coal. But there's way more coal than gas reserves, and coal is way more cheap and coal fired plants are more reliable than gasturbines

Which is why I would like to see coal phased out before it runs out. I'd like to see nuclear fission, natural gas and renewable energy used for electrical generation with a distinct move away from coal. Given that some people want to change nothing and some envirofreaks want to stop everything but renewable energy then I think what I propose is a completely doable and practical compromise. Let's eliminate (or at least reduce) the worst or the worst first and see how that goes.

[petrossa]

Which is why I would like to see coal phased out before it runs out. I'd like to see nuclear fission, natural gas and renewable energy used for electrical generation with a distinct move away from coal. Given that some people want to change nothing and some envirofreaks want to stop everything but renewable energy then I think what I propose is a completely doable and practical compromise. Let's eliminate (or at least reduce) the worst or the worst first and see how that goes.

Unfortunately people tend to talk with their mouths and act with their wallets.?

If you propose to phase out coal and replace it with gas at twice the price i don't think people come running.

Also don't forget that lot's of countries have their own coal reserves, whilst only a few have gas reserves.

All of eastern europe runs on coal. And their economy being wonky from day 1 they're hardly going to commit economic suicide by switching to double the price.

China is building coalfired plants at a fierce rate, they have such a vast quantity of coal there.

They even have a coalmines that have been on fire since the last 200 years?

Each day it pushed enough toxic waste in the air to make up for a year of our frugal living.?

The smouldering furnace 100 metres (330ft) underground at the second-largest coalfield in Xinjiang had released more than 70,000 tonnes of toxic gases annually since the 1950s. Two years ago firefighters in the area put out a similar fire that had been burning for more than 50 years, but there is much more to do.

Thousands of underground coalmine fires are believed to cover an area of 720sq km (280sq miles) in China. They consume as much as 20 million tonnes of high-quality coal and another 200 million tonnes of coal storage each year. ... The fires, often smouldering in coal seams on or just below the surface, have shaped the landscape of coal-rich regions in China for millenniums. The layers of coal can go on for miles underground, with fuel to burn for decades or centuries.

The smoke darkens already polluted skies. The fires emit poisonous gases and can even make the earth cave in — swallowing roads, homes, animals and humans — when weak ash replaces firm coal underground. The are also wasting resources in a rapidly developing country that relies on coal for about three quarters of its energy requirements, and the Government wants them extinguished.

The fires can start spontaneously. The oldest is believed to be at Baijigou, northwest China, and has been burning since the Qing Dynasty, a century before the mine opened in 1965.

http://peakenergy.blogspot.com/2008/02/chi...t-after-50.html

[Fred Derf Veteran]

Unfortunately people tend to talk with their mouths and act with their wallets.?

If you propose to phase out coal and replace it with gas at twice the price i don't think people come running.

Also don't forget that lot's of countries have their own coal reserves, whilst only a few have gas reserves.

All of eastern europe runs on coal. And their economy being wonky from day 1 they're hardly going to commit economic suicide by switching to double the price.

Natural Gas plants are cheaper to make so once you work out the net cost it comes to 3.9 - 4.4 cents per KWh.

Coal, if you do it properly (with the scribbers and all that), costs much more to build a new plant making the net cost come out to 4.8 - 5.5 cents per KWh.

So, we can clearly see that gas is certainly not twice the price of coal when you look at the big picture.

[petrossa]

Natural Gas plants are cheaper to make so once you work out the net cost it comes to 3.9 - 4.4 cents per KWh.

Coal, if you do it properly (with the scribbers and all that), costs much more to build a new plant making the net cost come out to 4.8 - 5.5 cents per KWh.

So, we can clearly see that gas is certainly not twice the price of coal when you look at the big picture.

Your presentation goes limp. First of all the Chinese don't put scrubbers because they don't give a ****.?

Secondly all current running coalpower plants in the poorer nations have no scrubbers.

Coal as a product is half the price of gas and there's a vast reserve. Soon as you're going to switch large scale to gas, gas prices will shoot up as it's not as readily available as coal.

[Fred Derf Veteran]

Your presentation goes limp. First of all the Chinese don't put scrubbers because they don't give a ****.?

Secondly all current running coalpower plants in the poorer nations have no scrubbers.

Coal as a product is half the price of gas and there's a vast reserve. Soon as you're going to switch large scale to gas, gas prices will shoot up as it's not as readily available as coal.

China is starting to care. They have upped the ante on the United States and set a goal of using renewable energy for 15% of their electrical generation by 2020.

I'm not suggesting that Africa stop using coal tomorrow but we, in the west, should lead by example. The environmental damage of coal is said to be as high as 10 cents per kilowatt hour.

[petrossa]

China is starting to care. They have upped the ante on the United States and set a goal of using renewable energy for 15% of their electrical generation by 2020.

I'm not suggesting that Africa stop using coal tomorrow but we, in the west, should lead by example. The environmental damage of coal is said to be as high as 10 cents per kilowatt hour.

?set a goal> , (thumbs through Newspeak dictionary)

to pretend to care and prevaricate doing nothing conclusive because you know the goal is unattainable.

And since acid rain proved to be a beetle i'm a bit skeptic about broad environmental claims.

The most sensible thing to do is just go on as before, use fossils for transport, invest very very heavily in some kind of fusion power and sit it out.

That way you don't waste time and money on greenie pipedreams and can just go on living.

[Fred Derf Veteran]

And since acid rain proved to be a beetle i'm a bit skeptic about broad environmental claims.

A beetle? What's your problem with acid rain? It is a big thing here in Ontario and even with "cleaner coal" scrubbers it is still a problem.

http://www.ec.gc.ca/acidrain/acidfact.html

[LittleNeutrino Veteran]

the only problem i have with solor energy is the fact that the panels are expensive and they only last for a few years.

[petrossa]

A beetle? What's your problem with acid rain? It is a big thing here in Ontario and even with "cleaner coal" scrubbers it is still a problem.

http://www.ec.gc.ca/acidrain/acidfact.html

Somewhere in here it says damage to european pineforests was largely caused by beetles, with acid rain taking out about 2% of the total areal.

http://books.google.com/books?id=_YoO8xKYS...;q=&f=false

the only problem i have with solor energy is the fact that the panels are expensive and they only last for a few years.

And fragile. One good hailstorm and you can start replacing them.?