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Coal fired power plants rated worldwide - lots of useful info
repost this link with more creativity if you wish.
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Southeast Drought Highlights Power Plant Water Waste
Georgia, and other states in the Southeast are learning a lesson that communities on the Hudson River in New York know well: burning coal the old fashioned way costs the river environment, not just the air.
By now, everyone's familiar with the list of pollutants that spew from coal-fired power plants, including the compounds that form ozone, smog and acid rain; those that make our fish contaminated with mercury; and those that fill the atmosphere with greenhouse gases, fueling global warming.
But coal-fired power plants -- along with nuclear and other fossil fuel plants -- also use a lot of water. Typically, this water is sucked in to a plant, used to cool condensers and then flushed back into the river or lake on whose banks the plant sits. In the process, millions of fish, fish eggs, fish larvae and other aquatic life can be killed, and heated water discharged can cause ecological problems downstream as well.
The Hudson River has been ground zero -- for 30 years -- in the fight environmentalists have waged to have old plants upgraded, and have new plants built to use minimal water. Most plants built today use a fraction of the water old plants use, but the Environmental Protection Agency has resisted ordering upgrades on older plants.
Upgrading plants is not cheap. Not by a long shot. But the drought highlights another facet of the issue: It isn't just about fish. It's about people. When drought makes water scarce, it helps if your drinking water needs don't have to compete with your electricity needs.
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With 45% of our country already in some stage of drought with urbanization, pollution, and substandard infrastructure causing waste, it is not feasible to continue pushing for new coal and nuclear power plants that will waste more water and endanger marinelife. That money could be better spent on altternate energy sources that conserve water and on upgrading old plants to use less water. Georgia, and other states in the Southeast are learning a lesson that communities on the Hudson River in New York know well: burning c... more -
No form of Energy-Production is Emission-Free
This is a short statement concerning the inflated use of "Emission-free Energy" or "CO2-neutral Energy" on this side, as well as on others. Let me brake it to you:
There is absolutely no way to produce energy without setting free CO2 (or equivalent gases).
This includes renewable energies like wind, solar or water and espeacially the non-renewable atomic power.
The reason? Even for the production of a solar-panel you will need energy. This energy will presently come from non-renewable sources. The production of concrete (which is important for building dams) will produce greenhouse gases and the production of enriched uranium consumes so much energy, that it renders the whole process of power production rather uneffective. Here is a ranking of the CO2-emissions for popular types of energy producing plants:
Brown Coal 1153 g CO2 / kwh
Black Coal 949 g CO2 / kwh
Natural Gas 428 g CO2 / kwh
Water 40 g CO2 / kwh
Nuclear Power 32 g CO2 / kwh
Solar Power 27 g CO2 / kwh
Windpark 23 g CO2 / kwh
Biogas -409 g CO2 / kwh
These are figures for pure energy production (except Biogas). Some forms of Power Plant can get more productive by around 1/3rd if they produce heat at the same time (this includes Brown and Black Coal and Natural Gas). Solar Power is only productive (in CO2 terms) if produced in suitable areas (in Germany it has a footprint of about 100 g CO2 / kwh).
There is a study availble about this topic here: http://www.oeko.de/publications/reports_studies/dok/659... This is a short statement concerning the inflated use of "Emission-free Energy" or "CO2-neutral Energy" on this si... more -
Is China Pulling Our Chains Regarding The Environment?
They say they want to give more to alternate energy and then open their biggest coal fired plant to date and enter into nuclear agreements with France. The saying you can't have your cake and eat it too is very appropos here. So which is it? They say they want to give more to alternate energy and then open their biggest coal fired plant to date and enter into nuclear agreem... more
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A Country Producing 5 times as Much Carbon Dioxide as China
I'll give you a hug if you can guess which one it is.
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Power Plant Rejected Over Carbon Dioxide For First Time
And in Kansas. This is good news and we need to see this happening in every state in this country. The states can make a huge difference in using their power to go above those in the federal government who would see their lobbyists continue to get what they want at the expense of our health and our planet.
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Power Plant Rejected Over Carbon Dioxide For First Time
By Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 19, 2007; Page A01
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment yesterday became the first government agency in the United States to cite carbon dioxide emissions as the reason for rejecting an air permit for a proposed coal-fired electricity generating plant, saying that the greenhouse gas threatens public health and the environment.
The decision marks a victory for environmental groups that are fighting proposals for new coal-fired plants around the country. It may be the first of a series of similar state actions inspired by a Supreme Court decision in April that asserted that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide should be considered pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
In the past, air permits, which are required before construction of combustion facilities, have been denied over emissions such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury. But Roderick L. Bremby, secretary of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said yesterday that "it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing."
The Kansas agency's decision caps a controversy over a proposal by Sunflower Electric Power, a rural electrical cooperative, to build a pair of big, 700-megawatt, coal-fired plants in Holcomb, a town in the western part of the state, at a cost of about $3.6 billion. One unit would have supplied power to parts of Kansas; the other, to be owned by another rural co-op, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, would have provided electricity to fast-growing eastern Colorado.
Together the plants would have produced 11 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, nearly as much as a group of eight Northeastern states hope to save by 2020 through a mandatory cap-and-trade program they plan to impose. The attorneys general from those states had written a letter opposing the permit.
snip
Kansas, long a conservative Republican stronghold, is not generally considered to be on the leading edge of environmental causes. The GOP leadership in both the state Senate and House of Representatives endorsed the project. Although the regional United Steelworkers union opposed the plant, the state AFL-CIO supported it.
"Now the Sebelius administration rockets to the forefront of the states to solve the global warming crisis," said Bruce Nilles, a Sierra Club lawyer.
end of excerpt. And in Kansas. This is good news and we need to see this happening in every state in this country. The states can make a huge differen... more -
Acid Rain Case Settled
American Electric Power Co. is not admitting any wrong doing in the settlement...but they are paying $75 million in clean up and civil penalties. They've also agreed to spend $4.6 billion on working to reducing their emissions, though a spokesman for the company says that amount includes money spent on those efforts over the past 8 years as the legal wrangling was ongoing. Typical. Only about 1.6 billion of that will be new spending. American Electric Power Co. is not admitting any wrong doing in the settlement...but they are paying $75 million in clean up and civil... more
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