Activists to Protest Coal Plant
Friday morning the Indigenous Environmental Network plans to protest environmental racism outside the headquarters of Sithe Global Power in New York. You may remember Sithe Global from a story we did a couple months back about the Desert Rock project, a proposed coal plant on the Navajo Nation that's been met with hostility from locals. Sithe, in collaboration with the Navajo Nation's government, is planning to build Desert Rock within a 15-mile radius of two other massive coal plants, Four Corners Power Plant and San Juan Generating Station. The Navajo government says a new energy project could pull a lot of money into the local economy. But Navajo residents say they are not likely to see much of that money. Many residents fear another power plant could endanger the local health and environment.
This week, members of the Indigenous Peoples from the U.S. and Canada delegation will protest fossil fuel expansion on Indigenous lands, addressing both the threat of climate change and public health risks presented by Desert Rock and projects of its nature.
The protest comes on the same day as the meeting on climate change being held tomorrow by the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
Comments:
Posted 04/26/2008 07:17pm with
The Four Corners continues to be raped and plundered—a National Sacrifice Area, as Tribal sovereignty is conveniently and relentlessly converted to corporate profit.
Posted 05/20/2008 11:30am with
The coal industry has for some time been promising clean coal technology. We must hold them to their promises. No new coal-powered electricity generation stations must be allowed to be built without the much vaunted carbon capture and sequestration [CCS] technology, already built-in.
Furthermore, all coal power stations must be retrofitted with CCS technology.
The excess CO2 in the atmosphere has a long lifetime before it will be naturally sequestered. Science indicates that CO2 remains in the atmosphere for a long time. Estimates vary but one study (Ref. 1) suggests that 33% remains after 100 years, 20 percent after 1000 years, with a long tail. Another study (Ref. 2) suggests that persistence of CO2 is 75 percent for 300 years and 25 percent for 30,000 years. In-fact, it is this ‘long tail’ in both cases that is responsible for much of the warming.
1 The fraction of CO2 remaining in the air, after emission by fossil fuel burning, declines rapidly at first, but 1/3 remains in the air after a century and 1/5 after a millennium
(Atmos. Chem. Phys. 7, 2287-2312, 2007).
2 The fate of fossil fuel CO2 in geologic time – David Archer
http://tinyurl.com/5le4sw
Posted 05/20/2008 12:44pm with
There can be no doubt that the promises of the coal industry for clean coal were never intended to be implemented, it was only a sop to the public. It is greenwash – bogus green credentials.
It is essential for all new coal power stations and users of industrial coal to be designed and constructed with carbon capture and sequestration [CCS] technology installed from day one.
All existing coal power stations must be retrofitted with CCS technology or shut-down. The timescale needs to be driven by replacement with renewable power generation.
Only by doing this will the coal industry be encouraged to implement CCS.
Otherwise the coal industry will continue its current procrastination and general foot-dragging.
The time-scale for phasing-out of coal power plants without CCS needs to be set, see below.
We need government to get serious about climate change and set achievable targets but certainly before a serious build-up of CO2 [science will answer this], tax-breaks and grants for the replacement of electricity generation from coal with renewable energy sources. This will be further substantial cause to focus the minds in the coal industry to accelerate the implementation of CCS.