Is "clean coal" just a dirty lie?

""Clean coal" is a term coined by industry and government to describe as yet proven methods of burning coal for producing energy with reduced carbon emissions. The term is actually misleading as burning coal for energy will never result in zero emissions.

The term "clean coal" is also used interchangeable with "carbon capture and sequestration (CCS)".

The are numerous concerns about the use of this term, including:

• CCS is not yet proven and there is a high risk that it will not actually be possible or viable
• Carbon dioxide escaping from underground storage could be lethal
• The United States government recently pulled its participation and funding from the clean coal/CCS pilot project called FutureGen.
• Burying (sequestering) huge amounts of liquefied CO2 is unlikely to be possible, and keeping it there will be problematic
• There will be high energy costs (and more emissions) to pump CO2 from sources such as power stations to locations where it may be stored.
• It will be very expensive to develop and deploy - probably more expensive than proven renewable zero emission solutions such as wind, solar and geothermal energy within 5 to 10 years.
• Much more coal will have to be burnt to power CCS (up to 30% more)
• Cannot capture all emissions from a power station so that even if widely used greenhouse emissions would not fall or stabilise but actually continue to increase
• It is highly unlikely CCS technology (if it works) will be able to be retrofitted to existing coal fired power stations - which should be decommissioned.
• CCS, if it can be made viable, is likely to be unable to handle the volume of carbon emissions from coal. While CCS proponents often point out that carbon sequestration projects are already in operation, the largest in existence (Sleipner, in Norway) currently buries just 1 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa) of carbon dioxide. Victoria has 65 million tonnes of CO2 from stationery electricity alone and this figure is growing exponentially
• CCS, if it can be made to work, won't be available for deployment earlier than 2020 (possibly even 2030) so it would be to late to reduce emissions over the next two decades - which is arguably now the critical period. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology interdisciplinary expert study on The Future of Coal envisages that coal with CCS may begin to make a contribution to emissions reductions around 2025. A similar result was obtained in an earlier assessment by the Australia Institute.

Policy implications

• Government funding and effort expended on "clean coal" will detract from that for proven renewable energy technologies that are available now
• The coal industry should be funding CCS, not the taxpayer
• We need roadmap to exit from coal fired power, not go looking for reasons and excuses to keep burning it.
• Government funding for CCS is actually just another subsidy to the already highly subsidised, private and highly profitable fossil fuel energy sector.

Some groups claiming to be "for the environment" such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Climate Institute have recently endorsed "clean coal" and "CCS" as viable options for addressing climate change and receiving government funding [link].

It is a concern that such groups are participating in industry and government spin which will hijack and confuse real action to address climate change, the end result of which could be catastrophic.

It is inappropriate for governments to fund and promote CCS as a viable solution for climate change that is on par with genuine zero emission renewable energy options such as wind and solar.

Note that CCS technology is viable and in use for separating and burying CO2 from natural gas at the Gorgon and other gas fields on the North-West Shelf. This is much more efficient than attempting to capture and store CO2 from burning coal, and the CO2 is pumped back into the same well the natural gas is extracted from.

Government funding should be immediately withdrawn from CCS research and development and redirected towards zero emission energy solutions, re-training programs for workers to move from polluting industries into sustainable, renewable energy projects and into carbon sink projects such as bio char (terra preta de indio)."

For more information and references see: Clean coal - Greenlivingpedia