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Tell Obama and McCain we need clean energy not 'clean coal'
You can send a message direct to the campaigns by signing at this site. Tell both Obama and McCain campaigns that their misrepresentation of "clean coal" is only hurting the progress we should be making on the climate crisis. It is we who must set the agenda, and the agenda now to save our planet and ourselves is renewable energy.
From the site:
During the Vice Presidential debate, both Senator Biden and Governor Palin touted their support for "clean coal". But both presidential campaigns and Congress are missing the point: Conventional coal-burning power plants are the leading cause of global warming pollution in the United States. "Clean Coal" is a myth--a contradiction in terms. Coal companies claim they can develop coal plants at some point in the distant future that will capture and sequester carbon pollution. But carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) is unproven and exorbitantly expensive.
We need real solutions, not coal industry myths. Use the form below to send a message to both Presidential campaigns: We need clean, green energy now! You can send a message direct to the campaigns by signing at this site. Tell both Obama and McCain campaigns that their misrepresentat... more -
Coal's dirty legacy one of our nation's greatest denials
Published on Thursday, October 9, 2008 by The Huffington Post
The Banality of Clean Coal: Extraction Crimes
by Jeff Biggers
"Three more retired coal miners died of black lung today. Over 105,000 Americans have suffered and died from black lung related diseases; 10,000 miners, according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, have died from black lung in the last decade.
Despite a recent spike in black lung diagnoses, U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration chief Richard Stickler recently announced he was too busy "to tackle respirable dust." Stickler's apathy is nothing new to coal miners and their families--until an aggressive grassroots campaign and a tragic accident attracted national media in 1968, most politicians and coal operators denied that black lung ever existed. Some doctors on the payroll of the coal companies even claimed that coal mining cured TB. In truth, the medical community had been aware of black lung disease since the 1830s.
Sound outrageous? Coal's dirty legacy has been one of our nation's most unbelievable denials.
In the 1970s, as the nation panicked during another oil crisis, the coal industry and its political allies announced a massive "clean coal" plan for coal-to-liquid gas conversion that would free us from foreign oil dependence. Sound familiar? Unfortunately, the coal conversion program turned into a prohibitive boondoggle, and the grand plans disappeared into the dirty air once the OPEC crisis subsided. In the process, the sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides emissions from coal-fired plants ravaged our forests and lakes to the extent that we coined the term, "acid rain," to describe its devastation.
As they had done with black lung, the coal operatives and their political allies denied acid rain as an invention of environmentalists, despite the fact that scientists had been aware of the impact of sulfur dioxide emissions since the 1850s. Once again, it took an aggressive grassroots campaign to nudge Washington into signing the Clean Air Act in 1990.
According to a recent Gallop poll, the majority of Republicans do not believe global warming has begun, or that coal-fired plants generate over 40 percent of our carbon dioxide emissions. A quarter of the Democrats are on the same side of denial.
In the meantime, a new 1500 megawatt coal-fired plant being built in southern Illinois--one of the biggest in the nation--not only stands to emit 12 million tons of greenhouse gases annually, but sits on the edge of the New Madrid earthquake fault line." article continued below or at link above. Published on Thursday, October 9, 2008 by The Huffington Post The Banality of Clean Coal: Extraction Crimes by Jeff Biggers ... more -
The battle over Coal River Mountain
About 470 mountain tops in Appalachia, including the one next to Coal River, have been destroyed. Mountaintop removal mining is faster and cheaper than underground mining but its impact on the environment is much worse. About 470 mountain tops in Appalachia, including the one next to Coal River, have been destroyed. Mountaintop removal mining is faster... more
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Clean energy 2030
"Right now the U.S. has a very real opportunity to transform our economy from one running on fossil fuels to one largely based on clean energy. We are developing the technologies and know-how to accomplish this. We can build whole new industries and create millions of new jobs. We can reduce energy costs, both at the gas pump and at home. We can improve our national security. And we can put a big dent in climate change. With strong leadership we could be moving forward on an aggressive but realistic timeline and an approach that balances costs with real economic gains.
The energy team at Google has been crunching the numbers to see how we could greatly reduce fossil fuel use by 2030. Our analysis, led by Jeffery Greenblatt, suggests a potential path to weaning the U.S. off of coal and oil for electricity generation by 2030 (with some remaining use of natural gas as well as nuclear), and cutting oil use for cars by 40%. Al Gore has issued a challenge that is even more ambitious, getting us to carbon-free electricity even sooner. We hope the American public pushes our leaders to embrace it. T. Boone Pickens has weighed in with an interesting plan of his own to massively deploy wind energy, among other things. Other plans have also been developed in recent years that merit attention.
Our goal in presenting this first iteration of the Clean Energy 2030 proposal is to stimulate debate and we invite you to take a look and comment -- or offer an alternative approach if you disagree. With a new Administration and Congress -- and multiple energy-related imperatives -- this is an opportune, perhaps unprecedented, moment to move from plan to action.
Over 22 years this plan could generate billions of dollars in savings and help create millions of green jobs. Many of these high quality, good-paying jobs will be in today's coal and oil producing states.
To get there we need to move immediately on three fronts:
(1) Reduce demand by doing more with less...
(2) Develop renewable energy that is cheaper than coal (RE<C)...
(3) Electrify transportation and re-invent our electric grid...
We see a huge opportunity for the nation to confront our energy challenges. In the process we will stimulate investment, create jobs, empower consumers and, by the way, help address climate change."
Check out the link for the full entry:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/clean-energy-203... "Right now the U.S. has a very real opportunity to transform our economy from one running on fossil fuels to one largely based on... more -
"Dirty fuels" profit by bailout bill's tax breaks for renewable ene...
The renewable-energy tax incentives tucked into the financial bailout package passed by the House on Friday include billions of dollars in breaks for old-fashioned fossil-fuel processes such as liquefying coal and squeezing petroleum out of sand and rock.
These "dirty fuels" are making a tentative comeback among policymakers. Such ventures are aimed at "unconventional" deposits once deemed too expensive or technologically difficult to tap. Backers of the tax breaks believe the substantial incentives might boost these technologies and spur invention of new ones.
"We feel good about the outcome here, in terms of the government supporting our requirements," said Larry Winter, vice president of Oil Shale Producing Exploration Co., which operates an experimental project in Utah's Uintah Basin. "As we start to expand our project, we will be looking to build our own refinery. That requires a very large capital investment that requires long-term paybacks. Without government support, they are potentially a nonstarter."
Critics of the measures note that the breaks run counter to the carbon-reduction message Congress intended when it vowed to bankroll clean, renewable technology. And a substantial portion of the tax breaks go to energy companies already flush with record oil profits.
"This is deeply offensive that they would attach this massive lobby goodie bag to a bill," said Tyson Slocum of Public Citizen, a Washington-based public interest organization.
"This is a gravy train. The American people are suffering here, and oil companies are getting a tax break. Not even clean energy. This is not a way to make laws. This is not even a way to make sausage."
The provisions are found in the complicated tax-extenders legislation tacked on by the Senate after the House rejected the original bailout package. Although House members were adamant that the overall tax provisions remain revenue-neutral, the add-ons will cost taxpayers more than $100 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Managers in the Senate said the energy provisions were needed to make the bailout more palatable to some Western members.
Energy companies say oil prices that exceed $100 a barrel make extracting some of these nonconventional fossil fuels profitable.
A recent report by the Air Force put the cost of building a coal gasification plant at $6 billion or more.
"They are not going to build those because of the massive capital costs," Slocum said. "This will encourage an industry where no one wants to invest -- for a reason. The question is, should taxpayers' money be used to shovel subsidies for coal?"
Converting solid coal into a liquid transportation fuel, an industry that does not exist in the United States, could nearly double the global warming effects of the fuel and increase air and water pollution associated with coal mining, according to some scientific estimates. The bill extends production credits for coal gasification plants and includes the end product, aviation fuel, in the alternative fuel category.
The coal investment credit will cost $389 million next year, the CBO said.
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It is obvious Congress is not really concerned about climate change. They will continue to spend our money on subsidies for coal, oil, shale, and nuclear, even though we are calling for them to look to renewable (REAL renewable) energies such as solar, wind, geothermal. They will throw a crumb once in a while, but not enough to give solar the boost it needs to be truly competitive with their cash cows. It's time to go over their heads. And this is the bill Obama and McCain voted for. They claim to want to tackle climate change and then vote for this? No wonder Bush was so quick to sign it! The renewable-energy tax incentives tucked into the financial bailout package passed by the House on Friday include billions of dollar... more -
Highwood coal fired plant to be built on national landmark
The Highwood Generating Station is a 250 megawatt (MW) coal-fired power plant to be located about ten miles east of the city of Great Falls. The project is being proposed by the Southern Montana Electric Generation & Transmission Cooperative (SME), a recently-formed entity that includes five rural electric co-ops and the City of Great Falls.
For the last several years MEIC has steadfastly opposed the development of new coal-fired power plants in Montana because of their enormous contribution to global warming. SME's Highwood Generating Station is of particular concern. The electricity is not needed. The technology is outdated.
*It will be located on some of the most productive farmland in Montana and will ruin a National Historic Landmark. Stopping this plant requires action at the local, state, and federal levels.*
MEIC with the help of local farmers and ranchers, a local citizens group (the Great Falls-based Citizens for Clean Energy), attorneys around the state, and historic preservation advocates are engaged on every front to give the public and decision makers a full understanding of the plant's economic and environmental impacts.
SEE MAP OF LOCAL LANDOWNER OPPOSITION TO THE HIGHWOOD GENERATING STATION (750 K pdf)
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And this plant will not have carbon capture and sequestration,but again, even if it did it is still not CLEAN. HELLO AMERICA, anybody home? The Highwood Generating Station is a 250 megawatt (MW) coal-fired power plant to be located about ten miles east of the city of Great ... more -
'Clean coal' policies absent, Government Accounting Office finds
Federal policy-makers have taken few of the steps necessary if greenhouse emissions from coal-fired power plants are to be captured and stored underground, according to a new government report.
Coal industry backers are banking that "carbon capture and storage" will allow the industry to survive efforts to control global climate change.
But the U.S. Government Accountability Project report, released this week, adds to growing concerns that the technology isn't ready now - and might not be for a long time.
GAO investigators cited underdeveloped and costly emissions-capture technology and legal uncertainties about the permitting and liability for carbon dioxide that would be stored underground. National studies, industry leaders and top scientists have all pointed to key problems with CCS becoming a reality, the GAO noted.
"Federal agencies have begun to address some CCS barriers but have yet to comprehensively address the full range of issues that would require resolution for commercial-scale CCS deployment," the GAO said in a 69-page study made public Tuesday.
GAO officials also concluded that widespread deployment of CCS is unlikely to happen unless Congress passes binding limits on carbon dioxide emissions.
"The absence of a national strategy to control CO2 emissions not only leaves the regulated community with little incentive to reduce their emissions, it also leaves regulators with little reason to devise the practical arrangements necessary to implement the reductions," the GAO report said.
Scientists are becoming increasingly concerned about finding a way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, while dealing with increasing worldwide demand for energy. Despite this concern, atmospheric concentrations carbon dioxide and emissions of the heat-trapping gas continue to increase.
Last week, international researchers reported that carbon dioxide emissions increased by 3 percent between 2006 and 2007. Greenhouse emissions have grown four times faster since 2000 than during the previous decade, according to a report from scientists with the Global Carbon Project.
Scientists believe that the greenhouse effect has already increased global temperatures by 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit since the start of the 20th century. Temperatures are expected to rise another 2 degrees, and perhaps as much as 11 degrees, over the next 100 years.
This warming will cause significant changes in sea level, ecosystems, and ice cover, among other impacts, the GAO noted in its new report.
more at the link Federal policy-makers have taken few of the steps necessary if greenhouse emissions from coal-fired power plants are to be captured an... more -
Gore: civil disobedience vs. coal plants
Fight back before they pollute the future away!
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Gore:'Civil disobedience' needed to stop coal plant construckion
Former vice president Al Gore urged young environmental activists to engage in "civil disobedience" to halt the construction of coal plants that do not mitigate their carbon emissions.
Gore, who won a Nobel Prize for his environmental activism, was speaking to a gathering of the Clinton Global Initiative, created by the former president he served with, Reuters reports.
"If you're a young person looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now, and not done, I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration," Gore told the Clinton Global Initiative gathering to loud applause.
"I believe for a carbon company to spend money convincing the stock-buying public that the risk from the global climate crisis is not that great represents a form of stock fraud because they are misrepresenting a material fact," he said. "I hope these state attorney generals around the country will take some action on that."
Gore and other environmentalists say coal plants are among the biggest emitters of carbon pollution, which contributes to global warming.
The New York Times reports that Gore did not provide more detail on what he wanted people to do.
Mr. Gore did not elaborate on his call for action. And almost as soon as the words “civil disobedience” were out of his mouth, Mr. Clinton, moderating a panel that Mr. Gore shared with the singer Bono, the president of Liberia, the chairman of Coca-Cola and Queen Rania of Jordan, turned to the queen to ask whether Middle Eastern countries might ever become “models of clean energy usage.” The discussion continued in a less-fiery vein from there.
Despite intense advertising from the industry, Gore said so-called clean coal technology "does not exist." Former vice president Al Gore urged young environmental activists to engage in "civil disobedience" to halt the construction... more -
Al Gore calls for civil disobedience regarding coal plants at Clinton Global Initi...
Al Gore, the former vice president and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is nothing if not passionate on the issue of global warming. But his usual fired-up remarks on the subject took a step into the Gandhian realm on Wednesday when he told an audience at the Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York that the crisis was so severe and intractable that it was time for direct action.
If you are a young person looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now, and not done, I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration, he said at the third annual meeting of former President Bill Clinton's initiative, which arranges partnerships between the very rich and the very needy.
Mr. Gore said the civil disobedience should focus on stopping the construction of new coal plants, which he said would add tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere despite half a billion dollars worth of advertising by the coal and gas industry claiming otherwise. He added, Clean coal does not exist.
The audience at the Sheraton New York Hotel and Towers, which was composed of hundreds of heads of state and chief executives, as well as representatives of philanthropic groups, reacted with scattered applause. There was a lot of shifting in seats.
Mr. Gore did not elaborate on his call for action. And almost as soon as the words civil disobedience were out of his mouth, Mr. Clinton, moderating a panel that Mr. Gore shared with the singer Bono, the president of Liberia, the chairman of Coca-Cola and Queen Rania of Jordan, turned to the queen to ask whether Middle Eastern countries might ever become models of clean energy usage. The discussion continued in a less-fiery vein from there.
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I can just bet people at the Clinton Global Initiative were shifting in their seats. ;-) Mr. Gore, I love you for this and am with you 100%. The climate crisis is getting lost in all of the talk about this 'election' and the 'financial crisis' that is actually related to our current energy policy. We do need more young people out here peacefully protesting to save their environmental future which also means saving this economy. And we also need older people as well to set an example for younger people about how change is really made. It isn't made by going to a rally of someone who claims to have charisma and can talk us out of it and thinking you have done something. It's taking action ourselves. I hope his endorsee is listening. Al Gore, the former vice president and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is nothing if not passionate on the issue of global warming. B... more -
Biden's clean-coal critique has Democrats scrambling
Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden appeared to undermine Barack Obama's backing of clean-coal technology when he told voters in Maumee last week that neither he nor Obama "are supporting clean coal."
In a video circulated today by Republican John McCain's presidential campaign, Biden made his comment as he mingled with the crowd when a woman voter asked him about clean coal. Biden told the women, "We're not supporting clean coal. Guess what? China's building two every week. Two dirty coal plants. And it's polluting the United States. It's causing people to die."
When the same voter asked if Biden supports wind and solar energy, the senator said: "Absolutely. Before anybody did." But then Biden added that China is "going to burn 300 years of bad coal unless we figure out how to clean their coal up."
"No coal plants here in America," Biden, a Democratic senator from Delaware, told the woman. "Build them, if they're going to build them over there (in China), make them clean because they're killing you."
Republicans pounced on Biden's comments, which left Obama's aides scrambling to control political damage in the coal-rich states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Virginia.
"I think Sen. Biden over the years has been an opponent of coal, and he basically said he doesn't want any coal plants," Sen. George V. Voinovich, R-Ohio, told reporters in a conference call arranged by the McCain campaign. "I don't think he really understands that we have 250 years of coal in this country, and it would be ridiculous not to use that supply."
Biden's comments came as he shook hands with voters along a rope line that separated the candidate from voters.
His words either were a verbal gaffe or reflect a split with Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee.
Obama, in his acceptance speech last month in Denver, pledged to "invest in clean-coal technology."
The Obama campaign dispatched Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va., a longtime backer of clean-coal technology, to assure reporters that Obama is a "true friend of coal."
Obama in 2005 voted for the energy bill that included $1.8 billion in federal money to help develop ways to burn coal without emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide is believed to contribute to global warming.
Boucher, who chairs the House subcommittee on energy and air quality, said that McCain voted against that 2005 energy bill. McCain argued that it included generous tax breaks to the oil industry.
Gov. Ted Strickland also noted in a separate conference call that Obama hails from the coal-producing state of Illinois. Strickland said he has discussed with Obama the importance of coal to southern and southeastern Ohio.
"I think the implication that an Obama-Biden ticket would be anti-coal is just simply false," Strickland said. "I think the coal industry has a friend in Sen. Obama." Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden appeared to undermine Barack Obama's backing of clean-coal technology when he to... more -
Earth to Joe Biden...it is time to COAL down!....Biden Says No to Coal Plants in A...
ABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: A conflict over clean coal is brewing on the campaign trail after video surfaced of Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., telling an anti-pollution campaigner in Ohio that he does not support coal plants in America.
Approached following a rally in Maumee, Ohio, last Tuesday, Biden was asked by a campaigner for 1Sky, an organization against the development of new coal-fired power plants, why he supports clean coal at a time when “wind and solar are flourishing here in Ohio.”
The animated, close-talking Biden then put his hands on the woman’s shoulders and launched into a passionate, finger-wagging argument that he and Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., do not support clean coal.
“We're not supporting clean coal,” Biden said. “Guess what? China is building two every week, two dirty coal plants. And it's polluting the United States, it's causing people to die.”
“So will you support wind and solar and alternate technologies?” the woman questioned.
“Absolutely, before anybody did,” came Biden’s reply. “The first guy to introduce a global warming bill was me 22 years ago. The first guy to support solar energy was me 26 years ago. It came out of Delaware.”
“But guess what?,” he continued. “China's gonna burn 300 years of bad coal unless we figure out how to clean their coal up because it's gonna ruin your lungs and there's nothing we can do about it.”
“No coal plants here in America!” pledged the Democratic vice-presidential nominee. “Build 'em, if they're gonna build 'em, over there and make 'em clean because they're killing ya.”
No sooner had the video surfaced then Republicans pointed out that Biden’s answer conflicted with Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention last month when he proclaimed his ticket’s support for clean coal development.
“As president,” said Obama, “I will tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal technology and find ways to safely harness nuclear power.”
And Biden’s remarks also stood in stark contrast to his own comments this weekend at the United Mine Workers of America annual fish fry in Castlewood, Virginia, when he told the miners that “we have enough coal in the United States of America to meet our needs domestically for the better part of the next 100 to 200 years.”
The Obama-Biden ticket, however, denounced GOP claims that Biden’s Ohio remarks were evidence that the Democratic pair opposes clean coal as “another ham-handed lying attack from the McCain campaign.”
“You know we have enough coal in the United States of America to meet out needs domestically for the better part of the next hundred to 200 years,” Biden said before launching into a critique of McCain’s energy priorities, slamming his support for billions in tax breaks for oil companies as the industry rakes in record profits.
“Imagine ... what Barack and I can do taking that $4 billion … and investing it in coal gasification, finding out what we can do with carbon sequestration, finding out how we can burn the coal that you dig that can free us from being dependent on foreign oil countries and at the same time not ruin the environment. That’s within our capacity to do it, if you give me $4 billion I promise you, I promise you we will find the answer,” Biden said. ABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: A conflict over clean coal is brewing on the campaign trail after video surfaced of Sen. Joe Bid... more -
Obama backtracking on wide range of policy
Why flip-flop on specific policies one at a time, when a candidate can do so much more efficiently by calling a general retreat? Less than 48 hours after telling CNBC that his health-insurance plan was fully funded and would not get affected by a massive government bailout of the credit markets, Obama has reversed himself and put his expensive federal programs on hold. He also criticized his own running mate on the Today show this morning:
Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) said in an interview aired Tuesday that the cost of the mortgage bailout plan may rein in his ambitious plans for health care, energy, education and infrastructure.
Obama’s comments reflect the possible new constraints on the next president’s ability to expand or start programs or cut taxes. The government financial interventions of the past two weeks could cost more than $1 trillion.
Obama told NBC’s Matt Lauer on the “Today” show that he doesn’t expect the mortgage plan to cost the full $700 billion right away, and all the money won’t be lost.
“Does that mean that I can do everything that I’ve called for in this campaign right away?” Obama said. “Probably not. I think we’re going to have to phase it in. And a lot of it’s going to depend on what our tax revenues look like.”
Now Obama wants us to forget the massive spending that he proposed because the Treasury bailout will pre-empt it. Okay, fair enough. But even before the credit market meltdown, we faced (and still face) an entitlement program meltdown of even larger dimensions. Neither candidate has adequately addressed that, but at least John McCain acknowledges its existence and its size. Obama has campaigned on adding to that burden without the least thought of reform, at least until he belatedly realized that the money simply doesn’t exist now, and it never really did.
The most amazing part of this is that he reached this conclusion not at the start of the current meltdown, but more than a week later. The general parameters of the bailout were widely known on Friday afternoon. Sunday morning, Obama tells John Harwood that it won’t affect his big-spending policies, since they’re “paid for”, in his words. By Tuesday morning, Obama’s hitting reverse. What happened to all that funding? Obama realized that the meltdown will rock the economy, and all of those soak-the-rich tax increases will produce little or no revenue — and imposing them will worsen an economy threatening to go into shock.
That led to Obama’s criticism of his running mate, less than 24 hours after Biden criticized Obama. Obama slammed McCain for initially opposing the bailout and then changing his mind, arguing that McCain should have waited for all of the information to come to him before taking a public position. Matt Lauer then pointed out that Joe Biden had done exactly the same thing:
But Lauer pointed out that Obama’s running mate, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.), had initially said the same thing – on “Today,” no less.
“I think that in that situation, I think Joe should have waited, as well,” Obama said.
It’s very rare for one ticket mate to publicly second-guess the other. But on the “CBS Evening News” on Monday, Biden had chastised his own campaign for a TV ad portraying McCain as a computer illiterate. Biden backed off his criticism of the ad in a statement the campaign released three hours later.
Obama appears to be seriously adrift. Circumstances have forced him out of the entire range of his domestic policies, including a middle-class tax cut, while the two Democrats seem more at war with each other than with Republicans. What argument does he have left for the Presidency — his deep executive and foreign-policy experience? Why flip-flop on specific policies one at a time, when a candidate can do so much more efficiently by calling a general retreat? Less... more -
Obama ;Opposition to AIG Bailout: "Joe Should Have Waited"
"What has been clear during this entire past ten days is John McCain has not had clarity and a grasp on the situation," Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told NBC's Matt Lauer in an interview that ran this morning.
Lauer was talking about how Obama hit Sen. McCain for flip-flopping on the AIG bailout -- saying he opposed it one day then announce he supported it the next day.
But, as Lauer pointed out, scarcely three minutes after McCain said he opposed the AIG bailout last week, "in an interview with Meredith Vieira, Joe Biden, your running mate was asked the exact same question, 'should the federal government bailout AIG?' And he said, 'No, the federal government should not bailout AIG.'" (As we noted at the time.) "And I think that in that situation," Obama said, "I think Joe should have waited as well."
"But it's the kind of thing that drives people crazy about politics," Lauer said. "It sounds like you were trying to score some political points against John McCain using his words, when your own running mate had used very similar words."
"No, hold on a second Matt," Obama said. "I think what drives people crazy about politics is the fact that somebody like John McCain who for 26 years has been an advocate for deregulation, for 26 years has said the market is king and then starts going out there suggesting somehow that he's a populist who's been railing against Wall Street and regulation -- that's what drives people crazy about politics." "What has been clear during this entire past ten days is John McCain has not had clarity and a grasp on the situation," Sen.... more -
Coal Hand Biden ... what?..... Gaffeaholic
John McCain's campaign is jumping all over a captured-on-video Joe Biden assurance to an environmentalist in Ohio that the Democrats oppose clean coal.
Barack Obama is actually on record supporting the expansion of such technologies, but Biden's words are prompting Republicans to lick their lips about the potential resonance of the issue in key coal states such as Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Colorado.
To drive the issue, they're circulating the above video, will hold a conference call later today with a coalition of elected officials, coal miners and executives from such states, stage local media events on the matter later in the week and likely cut an ad targeted at relevant markets
McCain himself is also picking up on it.
Fortuitously stumping in Ohio today -- where he picked up the support of an Operating Engineers local -- the Republican sought to shift attention from Wall Street to Biden's gaffe.
"My opponent is against the expansion of nuclear power," McCain said at a business stop in Strongsville, Ohio. "His running mate here in Ohio recently said that they weren’t supporting clean coal,
either. And the fact is that their billions of dollars in higher taxes would kill jobs here in Ohio. That’s not what Ohio needs and that’s not what America needs. My economic focus throughout this campaign has always been pro-growth policies that will create jobs."
The slip-up provides McCain's campaign an opportunity to resurrect an energy message that has, thanks to the financial crisis, been overshadowed of late. The campaign will make the case that Biden's statement reflects Democratic opposition to comprehensive energy solutions.
The hope: That this is one of those hybrid policy-cultural issues that, as with Al Gore's coal views in 2000, enables them to paint Democrats as out of touch on local economic issues and a way of life.
The Democrats are responding by essentially reiterating Obama's stance on the issue, implying that this was merely a matter of Biden speaking out of school.
"Senator McCain knows that Senator Obama and Senator Biden support clean coal technology," says Biden spokesman David Wade. "Senator Biden’s point is that China is building coal plants with outdated technology every day, and the United States needs to lead by developing clean coal technologies. The Obama-Biden comprehensive energy plan will invest $150 billion over 10 years in clean energy technologies, including incentives to accelerate private sector investment in commercial scale zero-carbon coal facilities. The Obama-Biden Department of Energy is committed to developing 5 ‘first-of-a-kind’ commercial scale coal-fired plants with carbon capture and sequestration here in the United States." John McCain's campaign is jumping all over a captured-on-video Joe Biden assurance to an environmentalist in Ohio that the Democr... more -
Joe Biden Directly Contradicts Barack Obama: 'We’re Not Supporting Clean Coal...
Joe Biden was in Ohio recently and the video above shows his answer to an anti-pollution campaigner about clean coal to where, among other comments, Biden said, "We’re not supporting clean coal." This directly contradicts Barack Obama's stated position.
The Politico reports the coal comments from Biden, who is the vice presidential running mate to Barack Obama for the Democratic ticket, which included statements about China polluting our air with their coal plants, he states, "No coal plants here in America," he goes on to say "Build them, if they're going to build them, over there. Make them clean," and "We’re not supporting clean coal."
Starting with Barack Obama's website, on his New Energy page, under the header of "Create Millions Of New Green Jobs," the fourth highlighted entry directly references clean coal where it says: Joe Biden was in Ohio recently and the video above shows his answer to an anti-pollution campaigner about clean coal to where, among o... more -
China, climate change and US dollars
Minqi Li: Renewable energy is canceled out by the growth of fossil fuels; US dollar depends on China. Part 9
"China's growth in oil consumption accounts for about one-third of the world's incremental oil consumption that's happened since 2000, and now China's oil consumption already accounts for about 10% of the world's total oil consumption. And the US accounts for 25%, but China's is growing very rapidly. And that is taking place, moreover, at the moment when we're probably at the peak, overall peak, of the global oil production or very near to that. And so you have this growing demand from China and some other emerging economies against a background of stagnating or possible declining supply of global oil production in the future. And so that definitely is a major factor behind the current global energy crisis."
Minqi Li is an Assistant Professor at the University of Utah specializing in Political Economy, World Systems and the Chinese Economy. He was a political prisoner in China from 1990 to 1992. He is the author of "After Neoliberalism: Empire, Social Democracy, or Socialism?
(For the other parts, do a local search for Minqi Li) Minqi Li: Renewable energy is canceled out by the growth of fossil fuels; US dollar depends on China. Part 9 ... more -
Phase out coal plants if we want to affect climate change
To better understand how emissions might change in the future, Pushker Kharecha and James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York considered a wide range of fossil fuel consumption scenarios, which shows that the rise in carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels can be kept below harmful levels as long as emissions from coal are phased out globally within the next few decades.
Global warming has plunged the planet into a crisis and the fossil fuel industries are trying to hide the extent of the problem from the public, Hansen, NASA's top climate scientist says.
"We've already reached the dangerous level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere," according to James Hansen. "But there are ways to solve the problem" of heat-trapping greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, which Hansen said has reached the "tipping point" of 385 parts per million.
Hansen calls for phasing out all coal-fired plants by 2030, taxing their emissions until then, and banning the building of new plants unless they are designed to trap and segregate the carbon dioxide they emit.
The major obstacle to saving the planet from its inhabitants is not technology, insisted Hansen, named one of the world's 100 most influential people in 2006 by Time magazine.
"The problem is that 90 percent of energy is fossil fuels. And that is such a huge business, it has permeated our government," he maintained. "What's become clear to me in the past several years is that both the executive branch and the legislative branch are strongly influenced by special fossil fuel interests," he said, referring to the providers of coal, oil and natural gas and the energy industry that burns them.
"You need a new Kyoto protocol with all the major emitters committed to it. Then you are cooking with gas." To better understand how emissions might change in the future, Pushker Kharecha and James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute for ... more -
Congress should say NO to coal-to-diesel
Yes, the country is dangerously addicted to oil, which threatens our security and our environmental well-being. But coal-to-liquids (CTL), the Fischer-Tropsch process, is not the answer, as Climate Progress has argued previously. It is just too dirty.
Unfortunately, as a recent New York Times article trumpeted: Lawmakers Push for Big Subsidies for Coal Process. The piece has an excellent figure showing why cellulosic ethanol and electricity are much better transportation fuels:
CTL diesel has twice the greenhouse gas emissions as regular diesel, unless you capture and store the carbon dioxide — and even then, CTL still isn’t cleaner.
But no CTL plant currently captures and stores the carbon dioxide and few are likely to do so any time soon — because the process is already wildly expensive. You need to spend a stunning $4.5 billion dollars just for a 50,000-barrel-a-day facility without CO2 storage, as detailed in a new Energy Department Report. And the U.S. uses more than 20 million barrels of oil a day.
So what is Congress contemplating?
* loan guarantees for six to 10 major coal-to-liquid plants, each likely to cost at least $3 billion
* a tax credit of 51 cents for every gallon of coal-based fuel sold through 2020
* automatic subsidies if oil prices drop below $40 a barrel, and
* permission for the Air Force to sign 25-year contracts for almost a billion gallons a year of coal-based jet fuel.
These are all dreadful ideas–subsidizing global warming. So why is Congress pursuing this?
Coal companies have spent millions of dollars lobbying on the issue, and have marshaled allies in organized labor, the Air Force and fuel-burning industries like the airlines. Peabody Energy, the world’s biggest coal company, urged in a recent advertising campaign that people “imagine a world where our country runs on energy from Middle America instead of the Middle East.”
Imagine a world with 20 feet higher sea level rise thanks in part to government subsidies to polluters. No thank you! Yes, the country is dangerously addicted to oil, which threatens our security and our environmental well-being. But coal-to-liquids (C... more -
What UK jury verdict means for anti-coal, climate activists
Will this verdict set the precedent for climate activists to stand up more vigorously in protesting climate change and the plans of coal and oil companies? I sure hope so. It is time for governments to be made aware that people are onto them. That when they say they want renewable energy we know they mean "clean coal" and nuclear and not TRUE renewable energy because it doesn't bring them $$$$$$$ in their campaign coffers. We are on to their lies and their smoke and mirror tactics to keep to the status quo... and we aren't going to be silent any longer. If scaling a chimney to write a warning will save one life from the effects of climate change or cancer, I will do it myself. This is also an issue of Democracy as well as environment. These plants being built are without the consent of the governed and part of deals made behind closed doors, and therefore, the governed have every right to protest them for the betterment of the whole, their families, and this planet. For these companies to continue to build coal plants knowing what they do to our health and our environment knowing there are cleaner, safer, better ways is simply willful negligence.
Photo credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8068270@N04/2414246369/
From the article:
The Maidstone verdict has changed all that and could prove a turning point both for the protest movement and industrial policy. It gave the clear political message that 12 people with - one must assume - no great scientific knowledge, had listened to the evidence of one of the best scientists in the world and concluded that climate change is now so serious and so urgent an issue that it is legally justifiable for people to invade a power station and do £30,000 worth of damage.
Out of the blue, the environmentalists say, the legitimacy of the government to pursue an expanding coal policy has been undermined and it may have become impossible for E.ON, the German owners of Kingsnorth, to go ahead with a new plant without fitting a £500m carbon capture and storage plant to collect and dispose of the greenhouse gases.
What is particularly galling for the backers of coal-fired power stations is that, because of the amount of damage alleged to have been done at Kingsnorth, the case went to a jury rather than a magistrate. The crown prosecution service and many corporations know that campaigners who challenge the law by non-violent action are being regularly acquitted by juries. In the past decade, prosecutions of protesters against GM crops, incinerators, new roads and nuclear, chemical and arms trade companies have all collapsed after defendants argued that they had acted according to their consciences and that they were trying to prevent a greater crime. Greenpeace itself has a four-nil record against the crown using the same defence and was widely known to be seeking a jury trial to present complex arguments about coal and climate change.
"They were pretty confident that a jury would listen to them more than the government," said one lawyer yesterday. "It gives them a platform. I doubt that we will see another climate change jury trial for many years."
"We are seeing a pattern emerging. The public is increasingly speaking through the courts," says Martyn Day, a partner with Leigh Day solicitors, which specialises in environmental cases. "These cases are a good guide to public mood and politicians should take close heed of them. It shows that society is greatly concerned about what is happening with the environment and that it is suspicious of government and business when they say they are acting responsibly.
"We're looking at a society which is far more in tune with the environment than in the past. Politicians and companies have not understood that most people now understand the issues. There's a feeling that government and the authorities have not been paying sufficient heed, and that the courts are righting the balance," he said. Will this verdict set the precedent for climate activists to stand up more vigorously in protesting climate change and the plans of co... more
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