There are two environmental by-products of burning coal: acid rain and carbon dioxide.
Burning coal produces about 9 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide each year which is released to the atmosphere, about 70% of this being from power generation. Other estimates put carbon dioxide emissions from power generation at one third of the world total of over 25 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions.
- Uranium Information Center
The reality is that coal is a prominent natural resource for many parts of the world. The good news is that there is the National Energy Technology Laboratory in the Department of Energy with a roadmap to have “near-zero” emissions, including CO2. Greenpeace is skeptical that clean coal is possible.
While it is possible to remove most of the sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and particulate (PM) emissions from the coal burning process, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions will be more difficult to address. Technology does exist to capture and store CO2 but they have not been made available on a large-scale commercial basis due to high economic costs.
- Wikipedia
A good start would be for the US to ratify the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty. Want to sign the petition? Do you know good ways to lobby the government for clean coal? Add them into the comments. Thanks!
