Earlier this month, we sent our guy Steve Gates out to D.C.’s Capitol Hill to talk to people on the street about where
electricity comes from and how they feel about our energy future.
Steve is our senior communications director, so I knew he’d be good behind the camera — but I was surprised by how much the people he met knew about electricity!
We’ll be doing more of these "Coal Walking" videos on the future, so subscribe to our YouTube channel!
Earlier this week, New York Gov. David Paterson (D) announced his support for a 50-megawatt power plant in western New York that would permanently store underground emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.
The governor said the facility has the potential to "launch exports of advanced coal technology to the rest of the world."
Great news that everyone can get behind, right?
Well…
Unfortunately, some environmentalists oppose the project. The Albany Times Union quotes Environmental Advocates of New York Director Rob Moore as saying, “The federal government has already cut off investments in dirty ‘clean coal’ technology and the state should follow.”
For some people… there is just no way to win.
But I wish people would get their facts straight!
Moore is wrong —the federal government continues to support clean coal. We don’t always agree with how it allocates the money (for example, see my many posts on the zero-emissions FutureGen plant)… but it hasn’t “cut off” one bit of funding.
The U.S. Department of Energy understands the importance of using America’s most abundant energy source and if anything it is looking at more ways to invest in technology to make it as clean as possible.
Toyota has announced it will add a plug-in hybrid to its U.S. lineup by 2010, and that’s great news for Americans.
Why? Because the energy it runs on has to come from somewhere – and if it is plugged in, odds are good that the electricity charging it is coal generated. By relying more on domestic coal and less on imported oil, we’re greatly increasing America’s energy security.
Plus… if the plug-in hybrid’s electricity can be produced utilizing CCT and carbon sequestration, we can also greatly reduce the greenhouse gases that are currently being released into the atmosphere by every car on the highway without increasing emissions in the utilities sector.
As I’ve said before, it’s going to take all of our resources and all of our ingenuity to solve the climate and energy puzzle, but announcements like this prove that we’re making strides in the right direction.
The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE) is committed to the idea that America can have the affordable, reliable electricity we need, with the clean environment we want. ACCCE’s Behind the Plug blog is the place for up-to-date news and analysis on clean coal technology developments and energy policy progress.
