Michael Wagner
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Consider Here--there's actually NO WAY to reduce Greenhouse Gases from Coal-Fired Power Plants... Read: + Clean Coal--Criticism / Wikipedia: "... scrubbers ... do nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming." So..., what's the deal? Here Read: + The illusion of clean coal / The Economist: --"The world is investing too much cash and hope in carbon capture and storage. + Trouble in store, carbon capture and storage / The Economist, + The Dirty Truth About Clean Coal / BusinessWeek, + The Dirt on Clean Coal / The Nation + King Coals Latest Con Job, Clean Coal is Not Clean / CommonDreams, + The Clean Coal Lobbying Blitz / The Center for Public Integrity: --They are the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, a collection of 48 mining, rail, manufacturing, and power-generating companies with an annual budget of more than $45 million almost three times larger than the coal industrys old lobbying and public relations groups combined. + Clean Coal or Dirty Coal? / Alternative Energy Blog: --Peabody Energy, the worlds largest coal company spent over 5% of its revenues on political contributions, for comparison Exxon Mobil and General Motors spent a fraction of one percent. In seeming return for such generosity, The Energy Policy Act of 2005 included five billion dollars of subsidies for the coal industry." + Stimulus Money Puts Clean Coal Projects on a Faster Track / NY Times: --"The allocation of $3.4 billion in the federal stimulus bill for carbon capture and sequestration ..." + Climate Change Protection, or Climate Change Assurance? / Bloggers for Change: --"the 1,200-page bill would also devote $60 billion to making sure clean coal isn't a loser." + The Case Against Carbon Trading / Transnational Institute: --"... Citigroups Peter Atherton confessed that the European Unions Emission Trading Scheme had 'done nothing to curb emissions. He admitted, ... Prices up, emissions up, profits up ... Who wins and loses? Coal and nuclear-based generators--biggest winners. Hedge funds and energy traders--even bigger winners. Losers ... Consumers!" + Methane: Sources and Emissions / US EPA: --Coal Mining releases vast amounts of Methane, a potent GHG. VERY, VERY SCARY!!! So..., you want REALLY, REALLY SCARY...??? + Slammer worm crashed Ohio nuke plant network / Security Focus: --“The Slammer worm penetrated ... Davis-Besse nuclear power plant ... despite a belief ... the network was protected by a firewall …" + America's aging nuclear reactors / National Catholic Reporter: --"... safety concerns are being short-changed as the government renews licenses of the nation's aging nuclear reactors. SOME PUBLIC INTEREST GROUPS SAY CAPITAL HILL IS IN THE NUCLEAR INDUSTRY'S POCKET." + Nuclear Plant Fisscoes Likely with Age, Secret Study Suggests / Cleveland Plain Dealer (@CommonDreams): “... nuclear power plants ... are undergoing fewer safety tests and inspections, according to engineers with close ties to the nuclear industry." "The combination ... fewer inspections and aging components–sets the stage for compounding problems." "If a plant shuts down its reactor to inspect a potential problem, it has to purchase replacement power. The costs run into hundreds of thousands of dollars a day.” + Aging nuclear plants pushed to the limit / Alliance For Nuclear Responsibility: “When Exelon upped power output by nearly 18 percent at its Quad Cities plant in 2002, key components began shaking so badly that vibration monitors were thrown from their mounts … Regulators were concerned, too: Metal chunks should never course haphazardly through a nuclear plant.” + Nuclear Leaks and Response Tested Obama in Senate / NY Times: –Obama in bed with Exelon REGARDING RADIATION LEAKS... + German Study: More Childhood Cancer Near Nuclear Power Plants / Nuclear Monitor: "A German study has found children under five are at 60% greater risk of getting cancer and 0 greater risk of getting leukemia if they live within five kilometers of a nuclear power station." + Nuclear Saviors: How Global Warming And Al Gore May Rescue the Nuclear Power Industry / CounterPunch: --"... the financial stakes are staggering—“American companies, such as GE, CBS Corp (formerly Westinghouse) and Bechtel, desperately crave those multi-billion dollar contracts.” A Nuclear Pheonix? / emagazine.com: “It may be that the funding issue alone derails the nuclear push: A Standard and Poor’s report last year priced nuclear at $1,500 per kilowatt–twice the price of a new coal plant. And cost overruns, it said, ‘are highly probable.’” + Nuclear's CO2 cost 'will climb' / BBC News, 04/30/08. --"The case for nuclear power as a low carbon energy source to replace fossil fuels has been challenged in a new report by Australian academics." + Popular Science's 20th Annual Best of What's New Awards / Nanosolar Homepage: --"Nanosolar has created an ink that takes sunlight and converts it into electricity. The ink is coated onto metal sheets as thin as aluminum foil with a printing-press-like device. The sheets are lighter, inexpensive and as efficient as traditional solar panels." In fact, the Colossal Magnetic Levitation Wind Turbine simply uses Permanent Magnets to reduce friction, providing power equal to a small nuclear power plant--but with a price tag of approx. $50 million!!! The MagLev's low-center-of-gravity = perfect for offshore!!! According to the US DOE, offshore winds around the US could meet our entire current electricity demand!!! Wind/Solar could make CLEAN Hydrogen for back-up Power Plants. Of course, the distribution problem with Hydrogen Cars is not a problem with Hydrogen Power plants, nor with Hydrogen Jumbo Jets... WHAT'S THIS TELL YOU??? OUCH!!!!!!!!!!!On Memo to Congress: Don't dawdle on climate bill posted 1 month, 1 week ago 1 ResponseClick here to view comment in original post
Here Consider:
The Magnetic Levitation Wind Turbine simply uses PERMANENT MAGNETS to provide power = to a small nuclear power plant--at a tiny, tiny fraction of the price-tag!!!
This where offshore wind surrounding the US = 24/7--plus the Maglev's low-center-of-gravity = perfect for offshore!!!
On Is a 4-day workweek inevitable? Utah cuts energy use 13% posted 3 months ago 4 Responses
Nanosolar (www.nanosolar.com) makes solar panels through a new print-roll technology, which allows them to simply roll "solar-cell-ink" onto material as thin as foil = cheap!!!Click here to view comment in original post
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Here Read:
+ Climate Change Protection, or Climate Change Assurance? / Bloggers for Change:
--“… the 1,200-page bill would also devote $60 billion to making sure clean coal isn't a loser.”
+Stimulus Money Puts Clean Coal Projects on a Faster Track / NY Times:
--“The allocation of $3.4 billion in the federal stimulus bill for carbon capture and sequestration, as carbon storage is often called, however, has allowed Duke Energy and other companies to consider mounting full-scale projects.”
+ Clean Coal or Dirty Coal? / Alternative Energy Blog:
--“… Peabody Energy, the world’s largest coal company spent over 5% of its revenues on political contributions, for comparison Exxon Mobil and General Motors spent a fraction of one percent. In seeming return for such generosity, The Energy Policy Act of 2005 included five billion dollars of subsidies for the coal industry.”
+ The ‘Clean Coal’ Lobbying Blitz / The Center for Public Integrity:
--“They’re the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, a collection of 48 mining, rail, manufacturing, and power-generating companies with an annual budget of more than $45 million — almost three times larger than the coal industry’s old lobbying and public relations groups combined.”
+ The illusion of clean coal / The Economist:
+ Trouble in store—Carbon capture and storage / The Economist,
+ The Dirty Truth About Clean Coal / BusinessWeek,
+ The Dirt on Clean Coal / The Nation
+ King Coal’s Latest Con Job—Clean Coal is Not Clean / CommonDreams,
+ The Case Against Carbon Trading / Transnational Institute:
--"... Citigroup’s Peter Atherton confessed that the European Union’s Emission Trading Scheme had 'done nothing to curb emissions.’ He admitted, ... Prices up, emissions up, profits up ...’ Who wins and loses? Coal and nuclear-based generators--biggest winners. Hedge funds and energy traders--even bigger winners. Losers ... Consumers!”
+ Nuclear Saviors: How Global Warming And Al Gore May Rescue the Nuclear Power Industry / CounterPunch:
--the financial stakes are staggering—“American companies, such as GE, CBS Corp (formerly Westinghouse) and Bechtel, desperately crave those multi-billion dollar contracts.”
+ Nuclear's CO2 cost 'will climb' / BBC News, 04/30/08.
--"The case for nuclear power as a low carbon energy source to replace fossil fuels has been challenged in a new report by Australian academics."
+ Integrity in the Balance: Al Gore’s Record On the Environment / CorpWatch:
“Terri Swearingen has heard enough of Al Gore's promises on the environment. "There may be some that believe he is a premier environmentalist, but not me," says the forty-three year old registered nurse and mother.”
“For nearly a decade, Swearingen has watched as the children of her quaint, working-class town in the Ohio river valley grow sicker and sicker. ‘It seems like every day we hear of a new cancer,’ she says. ‘Our children are getting cancer at a rate forty percent above the national average. In the past six months we've had two children develop a rare form of eye cancer. Do you know how unlikely that is for a town of our size?’
“In a campaign stop in Ohio, then-vice presidential candidate Al Gore blasted the incinerator as an "unbelievable" idea and promised outraged environmentalists that the Clinton/Gore team would ‘be on your side for a change.’"“He followed up his pledge with an official press release calling for ‘a thorough investigation’ because ‘too many questions remain unanswered about the impact of this incinerator and the process by which it was approved.’"
“But that was Al Gore the candidate. And in those heady days of the election campaign, he probably didn't realize that one of the financiers of the incinerator was none other than an investment banker from Little Rock, Arkansas, named Jack Stephens. Not only does Stephens finance incinerators, he finances politicians, including the Clinton/Gore campaign to the tune of $100,000 in 1992.”
“A bank subsidiary of his company even extended the campaign a $3.5 million credit line. Not surprisingly after the election, Gore quickly dropped the incinerator issue-and the plant continues to operate despite repeated failures of quality control tests. Gore has also remained silent on an on-going grand jury investigation into allegations that employees of the North Ohio Valley Air Authority accepted bribes to find the plant in compliance with environmental restrictions.”
+ Popular Science's 20th Annual Best of What's New Awards / Nanosolar Homepage:
--This honor goes to the remarkably designed PowerSheet flexible solar cells. Imagine a solar panel without the panel. Nanosolar has created an ink that takes sunlight and converts it into electricity. The ink is coated onto metal sheets as thin as aluminum foil with a printing-press-like device. The sheets are lighter, inexpensive and as efficient as traditional solar panels. The editors of PopSci believe that eventually every commercial rooftop could be carpeted with PowerSheet solar cells."
+ Who Killed the Electric Car / Wikipedia:
“… GM's efforts to demonstrate … no demand for their product … GM never responded to the EV drivers' offer to pay the residual lease value ($1.8 million was offered for the remaining 78 cars in Burbank before they were crushed).”
“… the oil companies were afraid of losing out on trillions in potential profit …They also bought patents to prevent modern NiMH batteries from being used in US electric cars.”
+ Subaru R1e / Wikipedia:
“The car uses a lithium-ion battery which was developed in cooperation with NEC and can be recharged to 80% capacity in eight minutes using a special rapid charger …”
On the one hand, with a Hydrogen car you’re sitting on top of pressurized highly-flammable gas, on the other hand, with an electric car you can charge from a home solar panel.
Electric cars could be made with a slot-car-type assembly, whereby you could charge when stopped at a light (in a few minutes you could get a significant amount of charge)…
If all the money that’s gone to King Coal and Nasty Nuclear went instead to electric cars and home solar panels—in fact, crude oil must be boiled to make gasoline, and it actually takes more energy to make a gallon of gas than the gas itself contains!!! Not to mention the GHGs involved!!!
On Senate panel to kick off climate hearings on Tuesday posted 4 months ago 10 ResponsesClick here to view comment in original post
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Here Read:
+ Carbon Dioxide Emissions from the Generation of Electric Power in the United States / U.S. Dept. of Energy:
"In 1999, estimated emissions of CO2 in the United States resulting from the generation of electric power were 2,245 MILLION metric tons ..."
+ Carbon Sequestration in Agriculture and Forestry / U.S. EPA:
"Pine plantations in the Southeast can accumulate almost 100 metric tons of carbon per acre after 90 years, or roughly one metric ton of carbon acre per year."
+ New coal plants bury 'Kyoto' / Christian Science Monitor:
"The official treaty to curb greenhouse-gas emissions hasn't gone into effect yet and already three countries are planning to build nearly 850 new coal-fired plants, which would pump up to five times as much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as the Kyoto Protocol aims to reduce."
+ World Rainforest Movement / WRM Bulletin No. 61
“The World Bank has a long history in forest destruction. … the Bank prepared a Forest Policy paper in 1991 to help ensure that its activities would promote forest conservation. … However, the Bank failed to implement its own policy.”
“International Monetary Fund loans and policies have caused extensive deforestation in countries of Africa, Latin America, and Asia.”
“… FAO (the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization), considered by many international bodies and by the forestry profession as the maximum authority on the subject of forests, is manipulating data on the true situation in such a way as to cover up the seriousness of the destruction process.”
+ Loophole may mean bigger, not smaller, cars / MSNBC:
"Too bad the rules will discourage automakers from manufacturing the kind of small cars that the Obamaites favor and, in some cases, encourage carmakers to do exactly the opposite.”
+ Obama faces key decisions about ethanol / The Hill, 2009:
“The corn ethanol industry sucks up $2 out of every $3 the government spends to support renewable energy, according to a new report from the Environmental Working Group (EWG) based on data from the Energy Information Administration.”
+ Ethanol vehicles pose significant risk to health, new report finds / Stanford News Service, 2007:
--mixing Ethanol with gasoline (E85 for cars, ect.) actually causes more everyday-type smog than gasoline alone.
On Senate panel to kick off climate hearings on Tuesday posted 4 months ago 10 ResponsesClick here to view comment in original post
With a Revenue Neutral Carbon Tax corporate taxes are reduced at an equivalent rate.
Imagine you and your neighbor are polluting like mad...
So,,,--you spend $100,000 on pollution control equipment...
But your neighbor DECLINES to do such--AND WHY THE HELL NOT??? It's not going to cost him a damn thing--any carbon tax he pays will be reduced from his corporate tax...
So...--simply cap GHG emissions, and if "you" cannot afford the necessary pollution control equipment than the Govt. can provide a 0-interst loan.
RIGHT!!! The sub-prime lenders decide to drastically hike up interest rates--pulling the rug right our from beneath people's feet--and driving themselves right out of business (or rather right into Big Brother's comforting arms), and so "you're" all like OH NO!--we can't hurt the economy. Like lets get it straight about what's important here...
Read:
+ Banks Gone Wild / Paul Krugman, NY Times:
" In fact, according to Fortune, Merrill Lynch made it BIGGEST purchases of bad debt in the first half of this year--after the sub-prime crisis had already become public knowledge."
Sheese--you lawyer-types are too much!!!
Read:
+ Why China Could Blame Its CO2 on West / Wall Street Journal:
"If you have emission constraints, it's become very attractive to relocate dirty production to developing countries ... You import the finished goods and leave the pollution in China."
+ China shifts pollution fight / Wall Street Journal:
"A significant portion of China's air pollution can be traced to the production of goods that are exported. In the city of Shenzhen, a major industrial base in southern China, about 89% of emissions of sulfur dioxide, an air pollutant that causes acid rain, are released in the process of export manufacturing. ... The study also found 71% of particulate matter, the small particles that cause smog and respiratory problems, can be traced to the manufacture of exported goods."
+ Invisible export--A Hidden Cost of China's Growth: Mercury Migration / Wall Street Journal:
"Mercury and other pollutants from China's more than 2,000 coal-fired power plants soar high into the atmosphere and around the globe ... The US EPA recently reported that a third of the country's (USA) lakes and nearly a quarter of its rivers are now so polluted with mercury that children and women are advised to limit or avoid eating fish caught there ... Some scientists now say 30% or more of the mercury settling into US gouund soil and waterways comes from other countries--in particular, China."
Yeah--what we need is a lawyer willing to risk his life suing the dirty bastrads for the mess they've made!!!
NOT HOLD BIG INDUSTRY'S LITTLE HAND!!!
On Senate panel to kick off climate hearings on Tuesday posted 4 months ago 10 Responses