While I wouldn't rule out carbon sequestration as a technology, as of now, the only players ready to meet our requirements are nuclear and solar thermal. Period. Wind and solar photovoltaic continues to demonstrate why these non-dispatchable generating technologies are primitive, exorbitantly expensive (wind costs 6 times more than nuclear power when measured by amount of power produced over the lifespan) and
with undisclosed side effect costs - neither can shutter a sngle fossil fuel plant since neither can meet peak demand requirements - both must be duplicated (wind by nearly 100%). And so-called "dispatchable wind" generates nearly the same carbon emissions as a natural gas generator.
Both wind and solar photovoltaic together generate
less than 1 percent of U.S. power and practically none of it when its most needed. Solar thermal looks to cost about 1/4th that of photovoltaic and 1/2 that of wind and can provide 20 times more energy density per square foot than wind.
Wind and solar photovoltaic are primitive, nearly useless methods of producing small amounts of low quality power , at times when no one wants it.
They will quickly disappear when solar thermal expands, unless the politicians are getting funded by the global wind industry and continue wasting govt money via subsidies. Non-dispatchable power should be banned from the utility grid.

"...there are some dramatic changes at the end-use level that could make even coal less damaging environmentally."

Yes, plugin hybrids are a good one.  

But geo heat exchange heating/cooling would save more GHG.  And a renewable energy distributed generation and storage smart grid is another that would save even more GHG.  

In fact, if those who tout "clean" coal as the only practical alternative (like you Jeremy), or fuel farming lobbyists, or the marvelous hydrogen energy economy fans, or those who tout nuclear power, lose the energy policy battle, then the time, capital, and political will wasted on clean coal (and these other awful corporate boondoggle diversions), could be devoted to plugin hybrids, geo heat exchange, and a renewable smart grid.

The dity coal (and oil)would only be needed for a decade or so, eventually totally replaced by renewable and conservation.  While this is ongoing, coal to natural gas underground conversion could take the grid from coal as the steady backup source to natural gas.  

Furthermore going to geo heat exchange could eliminate a huge amount of natural gas heating.  Freeing up existing natural gas supplies for grid power backup.  then a transition to solid oxide fuel cell/turbine distributed backup generation could save natural gas with double the efficiency of standard natural gas power generation.  This also allows the waste heat from natural gas generation to be used via this distributed cogeneration.

You ought to do a better job on these issues Jeremy, you are in a catbird seat as far as energy issues.  You owe it to yourself and all of US who support Stanford through our tax dollars.

Quit shilling for the coal industry.  Take a chance with your career.  Shoot the dice along with the rest of us.

Thanks for taking the time to visit, sorry if my critique was too harsh on a personal level.  But a serious wake up call is needed for the status quo academic establishment, along with  government and industry.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

One other thing:

How difficult is it to replace coal fired boilers (many aging and in need of replacement anyway) with natural gas boilers to feed the same turbine generator systems now powering the grid?

Conversion to natural gas is a viable interim alternative to clean coal.  If natural gas use in heating is replaced by geo heat exchange, gas can replace coal.  Start adding in biogas from the waste stream too. And lowering electric power demand by cooling buildings with geo heat exchange.

These are solutions that fit together in an organic design.  It is a lot different than the mechanistic so-called "free" market approach.  Coal reaps huge profits in the short term, build coal.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

To Amazingdrx - my understanding is that many if not most all coal boilers are started on natural gas.  This is true for the several I'm visited/inspected in Texas (fuel oil is rarely used IMHO). Huge pumps pumps air in with the NG to create a fire ball in the lower-middle section of the boiler fire tube.

When the fire ball is stable and all systems are "go," fine-crushed coal is blown into the fireball, from which ash and slag dropping out a sluice gate at the bottom. The NG is turned off then. The start-up process takes several hours and most regulatory agencies allow for "upsets" due to high emissions and smoke during this period.  

The issue with simply converting from coal to NG is mainly a thermal "cold spot" issue, since the boiler was designed to use coal; my understanding is that prolonged use of NG can cause the boiler fire box to eventually fail. I'm not defending coal as much as trying to say what goes on in the ones I've seen up close and personal.  

Onward through the fog

This is something I beat on all the time to my friends who might be tempted to drink the Clean Coal Kool Aid. That is that there are many reasons to be against further dependance or expansion of our use of coal, that have absolutely nothing to do with global warming.

First, is the fact that coal mining, even the old fashioned underground type, has always been an environmental catastrophe. Take the pollution with acid waste of streams, consider the menace of slurry ponds that have long cursed Appalachian communities even to the point of bursting and sweeping away whole towns.

Second, burning coal has always polluted communities with a witches brew of air borne pollutants. Anti pollution devices have only lessened not elimintated these pollutants.

Third, I have yet to hear a defender of the economic benefits of coal, who has explained to me why there is no such thing as a prosperous coal field. Coal has always gone hand in glove with dreadful poverty that rivals that of inner city ghettoes and Indian Reservations.

Fourth, coal's murderous record on worker safety.

Fifth, Mountain top removal. No need for futher comment on that one.

The backers of clean coal look no further than the power plant. But let us realize that if we make a deal with the devil, that all the above curses will not only stay the same - they will get much worse.

Randy Cunningham

Randy Cunningham

Jeremy,

I appreciate your pragmatic viewpoint, that coal is here and entrenched. Given that, its unlikely that it will just go away, so we need to accept that and do what we can.
Fair characterization?

Yet, the problem with environmentalists is that they hear facts and are not able to forget them or askew them in their viewpoints. Continued reliance on coal will literally drown us. Do I need to rehash all the negative effects that have already been listed?

The central problem I suspect that most gristers find with your post is that it advocates for moral compromise. Slavery had similar inertia in our economy, and I'm sure it wasn't cheap to transition away from. Or child labor. At the cusp of all these transitions one could advocate for reasoned, centrist, pragmatic viewpoints espousing a slower and measured transition. But that is because we refuse to bring price in line with costs.

Why chase expensive cleaner coal, which still emits  expensive carbon dioxide, with good money? That money ought to go into clean, renewable energy. That is actually the most cost effective long term investment in our economy.

But the long term growth and quality of life investment in our economy is always argued against by conservatives and conservative viewpoints. The conservative viewpoint tells us to hold off and let the status quo keep running a little longer, with incremental changes along the way. The conservative viewpoint was wrong on slavery. It is wrong on coal.

wiserearth.org/user/danielbell

Coal is in our future only if we refuse to reduce energy demand, do not put a sufficiently high price on carbon, and do not impose mandatory efficiency measures throughout the economy, especially in buildings and transportation. Utilities propose new coal plants assuming past energy growth of 2% per year will continue indefinitely, but this is based on underpriced cheap energy and dismisses the huge potential of energy efficiency. Also, demands for both coal and nukes is contradictory, since, if the utilities really believe coal plants can fulfill future energy demand, why are expensive nukes needed at all? Carbon sequestration must be demanded of all new coal plants, and this would be expensive; Joseph Romm in his book says $40 per ton of carbon, so therefore we should impose a carbon tax of at least that amount, which would reduce demand and undercut the need for new plants!  Amory Lovins' principle of "least cost energy strategy" needs to be heeded, thus forcing utilities to prove that projected demand can NOT be met by less costly and quicker alternatives such as efficiency. Coal utilities cannot be allowed to dictate the terms of debate or base their projections on the cheap energy of the past. The Architecture 2030 people are right on the mark, saying that stopping coal plants must be our top priority. Repeating the renewable energy anthem over and over won't bring it on line fast enough to meet the arguments of the utilities, except for wind power whose potential is being blocked by NIMBY idiots calling themselves environmentalists (like Robert
Kennedy Jr. up on the Cape). The environmental activist community is  failing badly, having accepted the unacceptable in congressional legislation and in believing that  we can delay substantial CO2 reductions over the coming four decades. By 2050, the target date for a 60% reduction in CO2, it will all be over, folks; just look at the most recent IPCC report which says if we don't make radical reductions in the next four years, there will indeed be Hell and High Water. The global warming activists are just helping the phonies in congress like Sanders and Boxer earn brownie points, when they should be storming the halls of congress en masse, with a unified set of demands for high carbon taxes, gasoline taxes and rationing, tough mandatory efficiency, and end to all fossil and  nuke subsidies and tax breaks. But they are scared of their shadow. Why? What do they have to lose? If they don't get their act together, we are ALL lost.  Is anyone else as angry as I am?

Lorna Salzman

It's maddening and frustrating, the way to do it seems so obvious.  And we have at least one or two leaders who understand that.  In government and industry.

Bhuto can get a million people in the streets in Pakistan, where they torture and kill your whole family if you speak up.  Why can't we get millions to march on DC?  It's a national shame.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog