Coal -- Messing Up Someone Else's Yard
Jan. 17th, 2008 07:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
helwenWMECO's Connection to Mountain Top Mining
So, was poking around on Sierra Club after I'd been reading all the stuff in the news about coal plants, and ended up at the above site, where I could find out if the electric company our service comes from has any connections to mountain top mining companies. Unfortunately, yes. In Holyoke our city had its own dam (with a fully functional fish elevator too), so we were pretty happy, but now.... could be worse I suppose.... Mass Electric (as opposed to Western Mass Electro/WMECO) is connected to _three_ coal mines. Still, it's pretty ugly what strip mining has done to these places. The main company at fault is Massey, which has just settled on the claims -- $20 million in penalties, and $10 million for development and installation of preventive/cleaning measures. The largest penalty awarded yet, and yet it could have been a lot more, especially had they not settled. OTOH, the company has plenty of other suits and court cases still pending.... I hope they get hit up for a lot more $$, because what they've done to the environment and all the communities in WV, Virginia, and some other states is simply hideous.
Folks can plug in their zip codes and find out about their power companies, at the above site.
I'll be writing to my reps, etc. tomorrow.... and now have even more motivation to cut down on electricity use. We're trying to anyway, but I can't stand the thought of contributing more to what's happened in West Virginia -- regardless of who is responsible for taking care of the talings, toxins, etc. If we all didn't use so much electricity, the coal industry couldn't use it as a reason for trying to build new coal plants all over the country.
Currently the coal industry provides a bit over 50% of electricity in the U.S. The Bush Admin types are predicting it'll go up to 60% down the line. Coal also 'provides' 2 billion tons of CO2, or about 1/3 of the CO2 output for the U.S.
Of course there is the battle between several environmental groups, as well as communities, to try to stop building of new coal plants. Some people object to 'indiscriminately' objecting to coal plants, whether or not the plant plans have any sort of scrubbing equipment included. Some plans have been scrapped either because of community or even state-wide protest, others because the proposers realized that it would simply cost too much to build the plant.
It's too simple of course, to say "Well, let's all just cut our electrical use by 50%!". Too simple because some individuals are already using 50% or less than what the average American uses, so you wouldn't see a huge savings on demand there. If most people here who fit the average profile were willing to cut their use by 50%, that would certainly have an effect. Of course if the rich folks cut their use by 90%, some of them would still be above average use -- but it would help a lot! But some places really can't cut back a whole lot -- hospitals for instance, or schools during school hours.
Although, if all hospitals, schools, police and fire stations (all necessary services) were to be upgraded in their insulation, electrical wiring, and other energy-saving measures, that would still make a measurable difference.
Not that I expect all that to happen, of course. But, in theory, we could almost entirely eliminate the need for coal plants... in the mean time, L and I will work on using less electricity, I've re-joined Sierra Club to help out with them raising funds to country the coal industry's lobbyists, writing my congress people, etc.
Sierra Club spent $1 million on stopping/slowing them down last year, and hopes to spend $10 million this year -- this is in response to the coal industry's $15 million last year and projected $35 million this year. You know, if they put that money into re-vamping and cleaning up the 600 plants already in existence..... sigh.
***
Meantime, there's an experiment in a few months that will be happening in southeast Washington state, to drill three narrow wells down 3,000 - 4,000 feet down into the basalt, where they're going to try putting in liquid CO2. The scientists believe that even if any of it made it out of where they're going to put it (if there's a crack in the basalt), it won't get very far (about the length of a football field, I think the article said).
The combination of the depth/pressure and the basalt should keep the liquid CO2 there long enough that it solidifies into lime rock. And it would do it as a natural process. There would still be the cost of capturing/liquifying/transporting the stuff, but if this storage system works, they're going to recommend it for places like the Southeast, which have the deep down basalt and very few storage options, to build containment units such as this right next to the power plants.
So, was poking around on Sierra Club after I'd been reading all the stuff in the news about coal plants, and ended up at the above site, where I could find out if the electric company our service comes from has any connections to mountain top mining companies. Unfortunately, yes. In Holyoke our city had its own dam (with a fully functional fish elevator too), so we were pretty happy, but now.... could be worse I suppose.... Mass Electric (as opposed to Western Mass Electro/WMECO) is connected to _three_ coal mines. Still, it's pretty ugly what strip mining has done to these places. The main company at fault is Massey, which has just settled on the claims -- $20 million in penalties, and $10 million for development and installation of preventive/cleaning measures. The largest penalty awarded yet, and yet it could have been a lot more, especially had they not settled. OTOH, the company has plenty of other suits and court cases still pending.... I hope they get hit up for a lot more $$, because what they've done to the environment and all the communities in WV, Virginia, and some other states is simply hideous.
Folks can plug in their zip codes and find out about their power companies, at the above site.
I'll be writing to my reps, etc. tomorrow.... and now have even more motivation to cut down on electricity use. We're trying to anyway, but I can't stand the thought of contributing more to what's happened in West Virginia -- regardless of who is responsible for taking care of the talings, toxins, etc. If we all didn't use so much electricity, the coal industry couldn't use it as a reason for trying to build new coal plants all over the country.
Currently the coal industry provides a bit over 50% of electricity in the U.S. The Bush Admin types are predicting it'll go up to 60% down the line. Coal also 'provides' 2 billion tons of CO2, or about 1/3 of the CO2 output for the U.S.
Of course there is the battle between several environmental groups, as well as communities, to try to stop building of new coal plants. Some people object to 'indiscriminately' objecting to coal plants, whether or not the plant plans have any sort of scrubbing equipment included. Some plans have been scrapped either because of community or even state-wide protest, others because the proposers realized that it would simply cost too much to build the plant.
It's too simple of course, to say "Well, let's all just cut our electrical use by 50%!". Too simple because some individuals are already using 50% or less than what the average American uses, so you wouldn't see a huge savings on demand there. If most people here who fit the average profile were willing to cut their use by 50%, that would certainly have an effect. Of course if the rich folks cut their use by 90%, some of them would still be above average use -- but it would help a lot! But some places really can't cut back a whole lot -- hospitals for instance, or schools during school hours.
Although, if all hospitals, schools, police and fire stations (all necessary services) were to be upgraded in their insulation, electrical wiring, and other energy-saving measures, that would still make a measurable difference.
Not that I expect all that to happen, of course. But, in theory, we could almost entirely eliminate the need for coal plants... in the mean time, L and I will work on using less electricity, I've re-joined Sierra Club to help out with them raising funds to country the coal industry's lobbyists, writing my congress people, etc.
Sierra Club spent $1 million on stopping/slowing them down last year, and hopes to spend $10 million this year -- this is in response to the coal industry's $15 million last year and projected $35 million this year. You know, if they put that money into re-vamping and cleaning up the 600 plants already in existence..... sigh.
***
Meantime, there's an experiment in a few months that will be happening in southeast Washington state, to drill three narrow wells down 3,000 - 4,000 feet down into the basalt, where they're going to try putting in liquid CO2. The scientists believe that even if any of it made it out of where they're going to put it (if there's a crack in the basalt), it won't get very far (about the length of a football field, I think the article said).
The combination of the depth/pressure and the basalt should keep the liquid CO2 there long enough that it solidifies into lime rock. And it would do it as a natural process. There would still be the cost of capturing/liquifying/transporting the stuff, but if this storage system works, they're going to recommend it for places like the Southeast, which have the deep down basalt and very few storage options, to build containment units such as this right next to the power plants.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-18 01:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-18 06:13 am (UTC)*headdesk*
That's what they said about Hanford waste, too.
They haven't learned from experience, have they?
Eedjits.
no subject
Date: 2008-01-18 03:07 pm (UTC)Lock it in a rock (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22506764/)
I re-read some bits of it this morning... there are pockets of trapped brackish water that are somehow part of the equation...
They don't talk about how the carbon gets liquified and if more gets liquified than created, by the energy used for the process... although one would hope that was the case, hm? Sigh