There has been a lot of support for the burning of coal of late, and the insistence that it is economically and environmentally sound.
As a matter of fact there is no clean method of burning coal and the GOP is crying "foul"
for tighter restrictions on coal burning plants.
I am wondering something; How much would a littering ticket set you back in your county, and
is throwing a bubble gum wrapper out the window of a moving vehicle as detrimental
to our ecology as the burning of coal?
I hear a lot from the GOP side that coal burning is "no problem," but where are the stats. that
enforce this belief and is mountain top removal and burning this earthen material a sound
investment into our future?
Coal is a fossil fuel composed primarily of carbons and hydrocarbons. Its ingredients help make plastics, tar and fertilizers. A coal derivative, a solidified carbon called coke, melts iron ore and reduces it to create steel. But most coal -- 92 percent of the U.S. supply -- goes into power production [source: Energy Information Administration]. Electric companies and businesses with power plants burn coal to make the steam that turns turbines and generates electricity.
When coal burns, it releases carbon dioxide and other emissions in flue gas, the billowing clouds you see pouring out of smoke stacks. Some clean coal technologies purify the coal before it burns. One type of coal preparation, coal washing, removes unwanted minerals by mixing crushed coal with a liquid and allowing the impurities to separate and settle.
Other systems control the coal burn to minimize emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and particulates. Wet scrubbers, or flue gas desulfurization systems, remove sulfur dioxide, a major cause of acid rain, by spraying flue gas with limestone and water. The mixture reacts with the sulfur dioxide to form synthetic gypsum, a component of drywall.
Low-NOx (nitrogen oxide) burners reduce the creation of nitrogen oxides, a cause of ground-level ozone, by restricting oxygen and manipulating the combustion process. Electrostatic precipitators remove particulates that aggravate asthma and cause respiratory ailments by charging particles with an electrical field and then capturing them on collection plates.
**Gasification avoids burning coal altogether. With integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) systems, steam and hot pressurized air or oxygen combine with coal in a reaction that forces carbon molecules apart. The resulting syngas, a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, is then cleaned and burned in a gas turbine to make electricity. The heat energy from the gas turbine also powers a steam turbine. Since IGCC power plants create two forms of energy, they have the potential to reach a fuel efficiency of 50 percent [source: *U.S. Department of Energy]. *
HowStuffWorks "What is clean coal technology?"
