Tuesday - April 14, 2009

NOTE:  DEMONSTRATION ONLY

The following articles are fictitious and included for website demonstration only.  They deal with the question of the efficacy of continuing investment in coal as a continuing power source given growing concern over its impact on global climate. 

Both the Obama administration and key leaders in Congress have undertaken major efforts to address our nation’s energy future.  Driven primarily by concerns over the impact fossil fuel burning is having on the global climate, they have initiated major efforts to identify alternative sources of energy and to deploy technologies that can harness those sources.  Retooling our industrial base, our power generation capability, and our transportation sector will be an enormous and costly undertaking.  Although the recently enacted stimulus package includes more than $40 billion in research and demonstration funding alone, some argue much more will be required.  Many feel that research and demonstration in coal and nuclear power is expensive compared to similar work in renewable technologies. 

The question becomes can we afford to move ahead in all energy areas or should we focus on a few technologies that show the greatest promise.  The first author feels coal’s abundance and affordability mandate the need for expanded research and demonstration of technologies that address carbon emissions from coal.  Failure to do so will result in massive adverse economic impacts to consumers.  The second author disagrees, arguing that scarce funding should be devoted towards cleaner energy technologies and that consumers are better served by focusing our scarce funds advancing technologies of the future.

CECA Solutions

PRO - Coal is Vital to our Energy Future

We need to recognize the critical role coal plays in meeting our energy needs and invest in technologies that can allow coal to continue playing that role.  With over a quarter of the world’s known coal reserves, coal represents an abundant domestic source of fuel.  Even at today’s level of consumption, our coal reserves can last us for more than 250 years allowing our consumers to be buffered from global geopolitics.  And coal represents one of the least expensive sources of electricity.  Due to its affordability, coal accounts for more than half of all electricity production in the U.S.  In addition, coal is also an inexpensive fuel that is considered critical for many developing countries as they attempt to raise the standard of living of their people. 

Coal, however, as one of our highest carbon content fuel is a major source of green house gas emissions.  We will need to develop affordable technologies that will allow us to continue to use this vital fuel source if we are to meet our global climate change goals. We cannot pass on this resource.  Regardless of what we in the U.S. do with regards to the use of coal in our energy portfolio, countries like India and China will still need to rely upon their vast reserves if they are to meet their economic development goals. 

Researchers are working on technologies that can economically capture carbon emissions and store them in deep geologic repositories.  Breakthroughs in gasification and sequestration technologies can allow us to continue using coal as we work on developing alternative means of inexpensive power production. But these are expensive undertakings, with demonstrations estimated to cost in the billions of dollars.  One promising project, FutureGen, is estimated to cost a billion dollars alone.  However, this is an investment we can ill afford to pass on.  Alternatives to coal for the production of electricity are much more expensive.  These costs will be passed along to consumers, resulting in higher prices for transportation, for heating and cooling their homes, and for operating their businesses.  The impact on the economy will be significant. 

The nation’s leaders are crafting a carbon constrained regulatory framework.  As they develop this framework, they need to ensure the funding is provided to address the environmental issues of coal usage, and not prevent that vital energy source from continuing to provide an abundant and affordable source of power that our nation needs.  We have met coal’s environmental challenges before as the nation recognized the environmental impacts of sulfur, nitrogen and other pollutants.  We can do it again.

Dr. Xyz, University of ABC

CON - We Need to Look to the Future for our Energy Sources

Burning fossil fuels is causing one of the greatest calamities mankind has ever wrought.  We are already seeing the impacts of the buildup of greenhouse gas in our atmosphere.  The polar ice caps are melting and scientists are predicting rising ocean levels, desertification of much of our western states, tropical pests and diseases moving north, and a whole host of other environmental insults.  We cannot in good conscience continue on the energy path we have built up over the past 100 years.  We need to look to the future, not the past, as we develop our energy options. 

Renewable energy technologies like wind and solar are already contributing to a cleaner energy future.  Technology improvements have reduced the price of electricity while improving the reliability of these energy sources.  Electricity from solar today, for example, is one-seventh the price it was only twenty years ago, while electricity from wind is nearly cost competitive with that from coal.  As we free our minds from the narrow vision of the past, we can expand our energy options to harnessing the energy in tides, solid waste, algae, and a host of other sources.  We might even develop artificial photosynthesis techniques so that we, like plants, can also directly harness the power of the sun or that we can tap deep into the heat of the Earth itself.

These ideas will take significant investments to ensure the technologies contribute significantly to our energy future.  Basic research is needed into advanced energy systems to open new avenues and further diversify our energy sources.  Continued improvements need to be made to existing technologies to make them more cost-effective and improve their reliability.  Financial assistance will be needed to help commercialize and deploy these new technologies.  Public investments will have to be made to create the infrastructure we need to make large scale use of these technologies. The scale of the investment is huge, but the potential payoff of an affordable and reliable clean energy source would be well worth the price.  The American consumer will be paying for our energy choices for years to come in terms of increased health care, food, and mitigation measures resulting from our continued burning of fossil fuels.  Consumers want a clean and healthy environment.  They want renewable energy technologies now.

Funding research into coal technologies would only serve to divert our scarce funding from the critical job of finding a sustainable solution to our energy needs.  As a nation, we have a history of under funding our renewable energy research needs as we poured billions into finding ways to mitigate the environmental impacts of coal use.  As we struggle to find a way to address global climate issues, we cannot afford to continue searching for yet the next solution to the environmental problems of coal.  We must shift our energy paradigm and put that investment into the energy technologies of the future. 

Mr. RBT, President of RBT Enterprises

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