Environmental protection?

Apparently the EPA has a plan to slowly decrease mercury emissions, basically coal-fired power plants, via cap and trade limits, while others are concerned about localized emissions as well as the rate of decrease.

I think I first heard the issue of mercury aroun 1995 from a speech by Winona LaDuke, lamenting the mercury pollution in the lakes of the White Earth Reservation, limiting the amount of fish people could eat.

Apparently there are different approaches to make coal plants less polluting, technological processes, and also burning "cleaner coal". Some coal sources are better than others.

There's new talk of "clean coal" with technology that can apparently reduce or eliminate all the air pollutants, even as far as capturing CO2! I must admit ignorance of how they do this. On the surface I'd expect all such efforts to "take energy" and so efficiency must go down in the sense of "less electricity output per lb of coal". In regards to CO2 sequestering, I certainly can consider the possibility that it might even take MORE energy to capture the CO2 than you can get out of the coal itself! I'm just saying I don't know, but this is a possibility, depending on the processes and perhaps even the coal quality. It might be some fraction of coal is of a quality that is sufficient to make a clean process work, and others not.

In any case, I think it's good if the cost of coal powered electricity is increased, it'll make other sources more competitive. Certainly it makes senses to either pay more to reduce pollution OR have a large tax applied to older power plants that pollute more, so eventually cleaner alternatives will exist that are price competitive.

This all seems good on the surface, even when there's hard political fights and slow progress.

STILL, I try to see further - what's the bigger picture? My main concern is basically that we're using the "cleanest" fossil fuels first, that eventually we'll be at a point where all the cleaner fuels are gone and then, if competitive alternatives have not appeared, OR that economic hardships will appear that make it easier to reverse environmental gains. What's the use of having a cleaner atmosphere NOW if we do this merely by using cleaner nonrenewable energy resources?

I suppose there's no resolution to future problems, so the question can't be answered. Of course the RIGHT answer is to say "All fossil fuels are nonrenewable and NO use is sustainable." The answer must set course to end fossil fuel burning. Efforts that merely try to make them less polluting will merely delay the day when we'll have to make harder choices.

IN SHORT, I'd have to say we ought to just admit that all coal burning for fuel is unacceptable, and set limits on burning it. That is, projecting a future date of no coal burning, and making a plan to get there, like via yearly reductions.

In contrast oil and natural gas limitations will pull us in the opposite direction - encouraging MORE coal burning.

I'm all for research on "clean coal", and perhaps there is a technical solution. I'm all for reducing pollution now as possible, but only to help us transition away from it.

I like the Native American saying that all decisions should be evaluated in regards to how it'll affect the 7th generation. It's easy to be idealistic and I know immediate concerns will take priority, especially in times of crisis. However when possible, at least the questions should be asked.