Comments on: Where coal and clean tech meet

Massachusetts firm GreatPoint Energy is one of few green-tech start-ups with "steel in the ground," testing a method for turning coal into cleaner-burning natural gas.

[sting7k]

Oh cnet, please don't get on their PR wagon. There is nothing "green" or good that will ever come from this.

[gertruded]

This process does not pass the laugh test. What a crock.

Yes, I am a Chemical engineer with advanced degrees.

[sting7k]

As a Biologist I am tired of all this "clean coal" non-sense. Haven't you seen those commercials cnet? That's about how real it will ever be.

[carlhage]

Even if the excess CO2 from coal is sequestered, the CO2 from the methane fuel is still equally bad as fossil fuel (fossil carbon still gets put into the atmosphere), so is not the same as renewable methane (or other fuel) created from biomass. I suppose you could say it's not as brown as straight coal, but being less brown doesn't make green. It would be sad if this company received carbon credits for re-burying the carbon they dug up instead of having to pay for the carbon in the methane produced. If we only had a straight price on fossil carbon release, then it would be much more obvious.

[shepsters]

There is no such animal as "clean coal". Witness the recent tragedy with 5.4 million cubic yards of "fly ash" from a TVA power plant inundating some 3000 acres one foot deep with the stuff and polluting all of the water (both streams and ground) with the likes of mercury, arsenic,and the like! And this is the same stuff that "comes out the bottom" of the GreatPoint Energy gasification tower. Also, their process generates MUCH MORE CO2 than just burning the stuff to start with. All in all, CNET needs to be a lot more circumspect else it/you risk becoming just another shill for big coal! Also a great big UGH to Dartmouth for even getting involved in a project like this one.

[folivier]

I am amused to think someday enough data will demonstrate that solar power devices will be more damaging to "Global Warming". The increased heat caused by the reflective surfaces and excess heat dispersed into the atmosphere will have greater impact on weather patterns than what is believed to be caused by CO2. How ironic!

[Angmarr]

Clean Coal - Oxymoron!


@ folivier

Youre kidding right!? thats not how surface reflective heating works. The greenhouse effect works because of the Co2 in the atmosphere reflecting the heat back!
Besides what makes you think that IF THE STUPID ENERGY COMPANIES start investing in solar power that we will still be using the same old solar panels???

SCIENTISTS - ya the people who actually know whats going on - as opposed to Politicians/lobbyists agree that Solar is the one of the BEST form of sustainable energy for our future!

[gertruded]

folivier, you are correct, of curse. However, solar power will not be commonplace until the corporations find a way to meter your use of sunlight.

Free power is not in the interest of the politicians/lobbyists or the corporations.

[Admirable]

Before you go all green tech why don't the energy companies clean up the mess they have already made? The following url relates to one of thousands of incidents involving the rape of this country by the energy companies. Do an article on that to balance your propaganda for these money hungry blood suckers...

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/24/spill_at_tennessee_coal_plant_creates

[JayWes]

Tennesee is only one, although probably the worst, example of this problem. In the lower Susquehanna valley, somebody had a nice fish pond using the waste heat from a coal fired generatoring plant (there is plenty from both coal-fired and nuclear plants, all of which are 30% or less efficent.) The Power company run out of space for fly-ash, so the fish pond had to go. The space was needed for a fly ash sump. Go look at this if you are in the vincity, If this lets loose, the fish kill will be from Unsafe Harbor to the mouth of the Cheaspike. ?Not to mention what would happen in a flood. The term "Clean coal{" is the best Lebanon bologna ever sprrung on the public. Speaking of fly ash did you here about a country that sent alot of Wallboard to the USA w, and used flt ash as a filler, Seems it is loaded with sulfer and there may be 100,000 homes contaminated,