Previous A Green-Building Expert Dies After Collapsing in Front of Class |
Next |
September 17, 2009, 01:26 PM ET
Sierra Club Helps Organize Protests Against Coal-Fired Plants on Campuses
The Sierra Club and student activists have generated news lately through their protests against coal power on campuses. The Associated Press offered up an article yesterday about the campaign, which has focused on a number of Midwest and Western colleges. The University of Missouri at Columbia, which in 2007 generated 80 percent of its power by burning 48,000 tons of coal, was one of the institutions featured in the article.
The article says a Sierra Club report has identified more than 60 institutions that have their own coal-burning plants or that rely heavily on coal, like Indiana University, Pennsylvania State University's main campus, Oregon State University, the University of Minnesota's Twin Cities campus, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the University of Virginia.
"University campuses have been at the forefront of many of the most important movements in history," Mallory Schillinger, a University of Missouri senior, told the AP. "Global warming is where the fight is at, and the most crucial part of that fight — coal — is located right here on our campus."
The article notes that a number of institutions have been trying to find alternatives to coal — like biomass — and have held off opening new coal plants. The article mentions a 2007 lawsuit that the Sierra Club had filed against the University of Wisconsin at Madison for pollution at its coal-fired plant.
Recently, the coal industry has pushed an ad campaign touting "clean coal," which many activists say is an oxymoron — coal has environmental-image problems not only in its buring but also in its mining. The article notes that an industry organization, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, cites an one reason why colleges keep burning coal: It's cheap.
--
Previous post: A Green-Building Expert Dies After Collapsing in Front of Class
Comments
1. billvenne - September 17, 2009 at 05:03 pm
UW Madison has be suckered into changing its coal burning plant to a PC friendly bio-mass burning one to the tune of an estimated $250 million. To my understanding, you have to burn way more bio-mass to equal the energy output of coal. So while your polution per ton is less with bio-mass, you have to burn way more of it for your energy needs, so it's really not much better. Why do it at this cost? In talking to a clean air advocate, she felt that bio-mass is not a good replacement for coal in the long run. This conversion is going to cost the UW students and taxpayers $250 million to not make much difference eco-wise just to shut up the knobs at the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club isn't having to pay for it, what do they care as long as it saves one baby seal in the next 10 years. If they were so concerned they would help pay for the conversions at the campuses. Put your money where your mouth is. The $250 million would be better spent on energy research instead of a power plant coversion. The PC people win again over what really makes the most sense.
2. calfrye - September 18, 2009 at 10:23 am
Two small points: a power plant conversion on a university campus *is* a research project in the problems of scale for alternative power. And the biomass burned in such a plant represents modern carbon, which would have been released into the atmosphere by other means if not burned in the plant. As such, it represents a reduction in fossil carbon emissions, which is where real gains must be obtained.
Add Your Comment
Commenting is closed.