ODI – The coal industry argues that more efficient and less polluting ‘advanced coal’ will help reduce carbon emissions and other pollution. What we can’t forget, ahead of next week’s World Coal Association meeting and OECD talks on coal policy, is that there are cheaper and cleaner options.
Burning coal generates about 40% of fossil fuel emissions. Current G7 and Chinese plants, alongside a dramatic expansion of coal power planned in the developing world, stand to blow our carbon budget.
To address this threat, the coal industry proposes replacing the most polluting coal technologies with advanced ‘high-efficiency, low emissions’ coal technologies. It claims that this will reduce emissions enough to keep global mean temperature under two degrees while taking advantage of coal as a cheap energy source.
Some also advocate that ‘climate finance’ should cover the price mark-up from conventional to advanced coal. For this to make sense, advanced coal would either need to be cleaner or cheaper than the alternatives – it is neither.
Advanced coal pollutes far more than alternatives Tiếp tục đọc “How clean is clean coal?”
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