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The advantages and the disadvantages of using coal power plants
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The coal industry has spent millions of dollars trying to convince people that they can create a product that is environmentally friendly. The coal industry wants the image of being a "clean" energy seems like a new phenomenon, where today there is better technology to understand the risk of coal and the everyday environment impact that can be seen today with the use of coal for more than a century for industrialization. I found an advertisement in the Wall Street Journal from 1979 in which the American Electric Power advertise that by crushing the coal they can deep clean the "impurities" in a bath of heavy liquids is the solution to "help make the America we see ahead a better America”. The second advertisement shows a more recent ad in 2009 from Peabody Energy (the largest private-sector coal company in the world) exhibits the progression of the ad for the coal industry has gotten worse by adding stats in order to make their point stronger and still trying to promote coal as "clean". This can be connected to the ecological modernization theory which argues that capitalism has the flexibility in order to be sustainable. The theory states in order to create a solution for the environmental problem there needs to be more modernization in order to create technology that is environmentally …show more content…
With the advertisements, they are selling doubt in order to confuse the consumer about clean energy. In reality, coal is bad in all forms even if it's washed in heavy liquids to clean the impurity it will not "help make the America we see ahead a better America”. Comparing the two ads illustrates there is a progression of technology, for example, the Peabody ad shows that they are creating new plants in order to reduce their carbon footprint and "eventually" they will capture the CO2 from the plant which implies they do not have that
A machine known as a dragline then digs into the rock to reveal the coal, the machines hollow out the tiers of coal and dump millions of overburden, the previous mountaintops, into constricted nearby valleys, thereby producing valley fills. Coal companies have covered over 1,200 miles of biologically crucial Appalachian headwaters streams.
The myths must be dispelled. First of all, coal is not a bountiful. It is a nonrenewable resource and, according to a United States Geologic Survey, it is only expected...
After reading the report titled “Coal Blooded: Putting Profits before People.” I agree that some coal-fired power plants do represent a health issue for those around them. I take exception to the generalization that all coal-fired power plants are unhealthy. The Executive Director of the Indigenous Environment Network, Tom Goldtooth boldly stated: “Clean coal is an oxymoron.” However, one only needs to look at Appendix III of the report. It indicates the exclusion of plants fired by “Anthracite/Bituminous Coal,” “Lignite Coal,” “Subbituminous Coal,” “Waste/Other Coal,” and “Coal Synfuel,” This exclusion shows your bias of the coal industry in general and coal-fired plants specifically. There is also the implication that coal-fired plants are
The article “5 Years after Coal-Ash Spill, Little Has Changed” by Duane W. Gang, informs that there has been little change since the spill. In the beginning of the article, a Tennessee resident Tommy Charles talk about how his life had changed after the coal spill. This was the day when the dike failed at TVA’s Kingston Fossil Plant, spilling 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash into the Emory and Clinch rivers. The spill was covering about 300 acres of land. After five years, coal ash still remains mostly unregulated. EPA and Congress still have not figured out how to see the material and the corporation still continue to argue about classifying coal ash as hazardous. Stephen Smith, who is chief executive of Southern Alliance for Clean Energy mentions that the final solution is not available yet. Later in the article it is discussed on how much TVA is spending to clean up...
Clean Coal Technologies (CCTs) are defined by the WCI as 'technologies designed to enhance both the efficiency and the environmental acceptability of coal extraction, preparation and use' . These technologies reduce emissions, reduce waste, and increase the amount of energy gained from each ton of coal. There are a wide variety of technologies that are available to improve our coal performance. This can be done by: Enhancing of existing options, Deploying of Advanced Technologies, Exploiting Synergies with Renewables, and Development and Commercialization of Next Generation Technologies (“Coal”). Some environmental problems that they will be trying to address are: Particulate matter, trace elements and SOX and NOX, and mercury.
Coal mining in the 1920s was extremely difficult job in which miners endured many challenges and hardships. The 1920’s safety was not on everyone’s mind. It was as if the miners were just tools to be used. The equipment the miners used was a marvel for its time, as it was just the start to a technological advancement. Miners faced hardships such as low wages, long hours, and the difficulty of the work conditions.
As a Kentucky resident, I understand that coal is much more than form of energy, for many it is a way of life. Kentucky is the third largest producer of coal in the United States, and for many families in Eastern Kentucky, the coal industry has provided stable employment for generations. I would like to make clear that I am not speaking out against coal mining in general; I am speaking out against one method of mining. Mountaintop removal mining is the most destructive form of coal extraction in existence...
The reason we don’t replace coal energy is because it produces a profitable amount of energy, just like most cars get fairly good mpg. While solar and wind energy are not efficient and take a ton of sun and wind as well as entire farms of panels or mills to produce the same amount of energy, which goes back to solar and wind being more expensive.
Imagine having a loved one with cancer, organ damage, nervous system disorders, or your child having birth defects. Imagine running out of clean water because the only water available is capable of catching fire. Imagine oil in rivers and animals losing their homes. See yourself caught in an earthquake where there should not be one. All of this is increased by fracking and can be prevented. The question is should fracking continue or should it be banned.
The coal obviously will not be the one. Apart from the finitude of coal miner, coal itself is the cause of lots of pollution. The combustion of coal, especially carbon dioxide, contributes most to acid rain as well as air pollution, and has been connected with global warming. Moreover, a number of verse health effects of coal burning exist. Coal-fired power plants cause nearly 24,000 premature deaths annually in the United States, including 2,800 from lung cancer. ("Deadly Power Plants? Study Fuels Debate: Thousands of Early Deaths Tied To Emissions." MSNBC (2004-09-06) .Retrieved 5 November 2008.) Annual health costs in Europe from use of coal to generate electricity are €42.8 billion, or $55 billion. ("The Unpaid Health Bill – How coal power plants make us sick". Health and Environment Alliance. Retrieved 7 March 2013.)
Burning and mining coal for fuel is harmful to the environment but because how cheap and easy it is to find many people are unwilling to give it up as a fuel source. One of the problems with coal is that they are limited and are non-renewable so once it has been used we won’t be able to use it again.
Fossil Fuels are known for making a mess and causing a lot of environmental problems. They can create some serious pollution to the environment. One of the worse air pollution episodes occurred in 1948. In Donora, Pa twenty were found dead and over six thousand became quite ill quickly. The main cause of this disaster was the due to the high concentrations of SO2. That is why it is important to do whatever you can to eliminate as much as the pollution factor as you can. Cleaning the coal before combustion pretreatment will reduce pollution and even when your done cleaning you can clean the stack gases after combustion. This is an often-missed step in the pollution elimination process. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham has a new idea why to clean the coal. This isn’t just for environment safety but he believes that it will be a major source of hydrogen in the years to come.
The coal mining has several disadvantages which not only limited to carbon di oxide emission but also affect the land, water, human health and other species life. Underground and opencast mining both have their tremendous disadvantages for environment and the society. Underground mining requires fire blast which has lined up severe situations like human safety and environmental pollution. These activities are also responsible for the displacement of the human beings, animals and other species hence it will disturb the ecosystem. In 2006, 30 million people displace which was 50% higher than the year of 1991. The coal mining also requires large amount of water from the nearby source and this waste and contaminated water generally disposed to some river and land. These activities affect the normal drinking water, underground/surface water and the minerals of lands. The large scale excavations, removal of surface soil, dumping chemical wastes, creation of road, cutting of mountains etc. all these actions causing severe impact on the land. The land deforestation is one of the most severe problems because it’s also related to the local people and animals. Number of species and animals rapidly got endangered from the past few years because of such activities.
Smoking cigarettes is a very deadly addiction that, unfortunately, 42.1 million adults in the United States and 6.4 million children have. The reason why so many people get addicted to cigarettes because of nicotine. Medicinenet.com says that nicotine is “Made by the tobacco plant or produced synthetically. Nicotine has powerful pharmacologic effects (including increased heart rate, heart stroke volume, and oxygen consumption by the heart muscle), as well as powerful psychodynamic effects (such as euphoria, increased alertness, and a sense of relaxation). Nicotine is also powerfully addictive.”
Fuels like coal, and oil that once were a fine innovation in creating energy are now rapidly deleting and one day will be gone forever; energy that won’t last is often referred to as non-renewable energy. Besides being set up to fail and become inefficient in the future, fossil fuel energy is not clean to use and poses several environmental complications. Coal, for instance is “the dirtiest of all fossil fuels. Coal combustion not only produces sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides that contribute to acid rain and snow, it generates millions of tons of particulates that cause asthma and other respiratory diseases.” As with all usage of fossil fuels, it creates enormous amounts of carbon dioxide, which contributes to greenhouse gas. Not only are fossil fuels dirty, they also pose as a security risk and unforgiving on the American wallet. (Saini)