Comments on: Testing the outcomes of Rudd’s clean coal pledge

By: Roger Clifton

Roger Clifton — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 23:45:04 +0000

The “young and poor” do indeed have a role.
They could and perhaps should be taking to the streets,
demanding action towards a carbon-free economy.

By: AR

AR — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 21:36:48 +0000

How (un)strange that governments throw billions (overt & covert such as liability negation) at BigBiz tek fixes such nukes & coal. Nothing whatsoever to do with placating old money.
When did those who have ever want to redistribute? The only people who ever want to change (any given) status quo are those with no stake. Oddly, they tend to be young and/or poor. Hooda thunk it?

By: Tom McLoughlin

Tom McLoughlin — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 06:55:49 +0000

Oh Peter Logue, perhaps Mr McIndoe (front page The Oz today) who said on Insider Business/Kohler interview yesterday that CCS was ‘a medium to long term’ proposition … 2020 but more like 2025’. That’s 16 years of tipping points away.

Get it? Nothing until 2025 to really get our teeth into burgeoning GHG’s from CO2? Thanks mate!

By: Tom McLoughlin

Tom McLoughlin — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 06:52:17 +0000

Here, here, Norway Safety Authority similar in 2008 but gets squashed by big politics (?) as reported here by moi April 2008 (and no one else in Australia seemed too concerned about Norway Safety Authority getting monstered)

http://www.sydneyalternativemedia.com/blog/index.blog/1802445/energy-minister-ferguson-gambling-on-safety-of-co2-carbon-capture-after-norway-report/

High pressure CO2 over thousands of kilometres of piping with the capacity to leak out over night unchecked, odourless, colourless combined with the inevitability of human error.

Nice.

By: Peter Logue

Peter Logue — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 06:04:43 +0000

Clive, this is getting a bit tedious. But you really do have to take the blinkers off and take some time to find out what’s really going on, rather than just relying on the a mish-mash of naysayers who have a pathological hatred for the coal industry, but who continue to use coal fired power for their air conditioners and their plasma screens and, even, their hybrid cars.

For every “expert” you quote saying that CCS won’t work, I can quote a dozen who are working in the field and say that it will. Yep, some of them even work for that nasty, tainted CSIRO, but many work at power stations, in the oil, gas and petroleum industry and in bodies like the CO2CRC.

The reasons why people are working and governments and industry are investing billions to make CCS work are many and they’re not going to stop because you quote from an article by a journalist in the Economist. With an application to gas fired power,(that’s GAS with substantial CO2 emissions Clive, not COAL) steel making, coal fired power, cement manufacture etc, it will provide substantial cuts to greenhouse gas emissions and allow countries with huge coal reserves — like India and China - to continue to burn their coal (which they will do no matter what we say in the West) and enjoy cheap(er) and reliable sources of energy. All forms of energy will be required in this energy hungry world. What is so scary here?

It’s a technology fix that will reduce the emissions that the world is worried about and sensible environmentalists are supporting it, no matter what they think of the industries involved. What you continue to do is aggregate every negative comment you can find and run a scare campaign based on emotion not on hard information.

You talk about the energy premium in using CCS; well, how about using CCS in tandem with renewable energy, something a number of projecs are pursing?

You claim we cannot store the CO2; pick up the phone and talk to Dr Peter Cook of the CO2CRC. He’ll tell you are wrong and he knows a lot more about it than you or me and he doesn’t work for the coal industry.

There will be a commercial scale, coal-fired power plant operating in Australia with carbon capture and storage by 2017 at the latest, otherwise I will owe Bernard Keane a case of good wine and that’s a bet I didn’t make lightly.

Other technologies - solar thermal, geo thermal, will also begin to mature around that time or perhaps a few years later. Who knows, someone might get solar fusion to work. And then the bean-counters will come in and make their investment decisions on which fuel source or technology to go with. Nothing mysterious or conspiratorial in that.

If you want to talk to the people working on these projects - if that would do any good - I’m happy to organise it for you.

For those who don’t know, I work for the Australian Coal Association.

By: Brett Wright

Brett Wright — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 05:36:14 +0000

Evan
I thought Ziggy Switkowski was of the view that nuclear power was the only viable short-term energy option. Clive Hamilton quotes the Economist in saying that efforts to develop CCS are an ploy to placate the coal lobby, and I’m inclined to agree. But which lobby are we placating by refusing to investigate nuclear power in Australia?

By: Evan Beaver

Evan Beaver — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 04:11:56 +0000

Roger, the political and economic realities of nuclear have been answered. Read the Switkowski report. Too expensive, technically very, very difficult, too slow to build, dirty waste. Nuclear isn’t going to help us now. Maybe 30 years ago, but not now.

I agree with every part of this article Clive. It’s virtually impossible to capture all the CO2 coming out of power plants at the moment. Why not just stop stuffing around and invest in renewables?

By: Roger Clifton

Roger Clifton — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 03:53:04 +0000

If our leaders were serious about climate change,
they would be addressing the political questions about nuclear,
instead of decorating the intractable problems of coal.