Gregory Boyce, CEO of Peabody (coal), sat down for an interview with USA Today recently. According to the article, Boyce isn't sweating too terribly much about coal's huge greenhouse gas emissions because--get this--"Black is the new Green".
From the Center for American Progress:
“There’s a perception out there that coal is dirty, and we have to change that,” he adds, noting that coal plants already have cut emissions of some pollutants and boosted efficiency to slash CO2 discharges. “Black is the new green.“Huh. Must be a really dark green:
And that $275,000 dollar donation from Peabody to Newt Gingrich's "American Solutions For Winning The Future" 527 promoting the "Drill Here Drill Now" thing? Sounds like the same old green to us.“Clean coal” is a shorthand term for “technologies designed to enhance both the efficiency and the environmental acceptability of coal extraction, preparation and use.” This includes established technologies used to capture methane emitted during coal mining and to “wash” coal before it is burned to separate toxic impurities, as well as technologies to capture and geologically store its greenhouse emissions (CCS) that are “expensive, experimental and not in commercial use.”
The coal industry, with the assistance of the current administration, has been fighting regulations to establish or enforce the use of existing technologies to reduce traditional air pollutants produced by coal-burning like mercury and sulfur dioxide. In climate scientist James Hansen’s analysis, the only way to avoid climate catastrophe is to establish “an immediate moratorium on additional coal-fired power plants without CCS.”
See you at the movies.
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