Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Oxymoron - Clean Coal

As I heard the news on the radio the other day that the Antarctic ice cap was melting faster than expected, I was reminded of Al Gore's short message at TED. He was back this year, with some new slides about methane, pointing out that as the climate warms and frozen northern lakes thaw, they release methane and contribute to more global warming, thus feeding the vicious cycle of climate change. He had rather ignored methane in his previous slide show; of course, methane is even more pernicious than carbon monoxide.

He also inveighed against the oxymoronic concept of clean coal and the huge amount of money (a quarter of a billion dollars) being spent to advertise it.

No comments: