As the general population becomes more aware of our environmental challenges and the emerging energy crisis certain words have become popular in the media.  Not too many years ago words like sustainable, green or renewable would bring snickers from people who thought the environmental movement and search for alternative energy sources were just hoaxes perpetuated by those with purely political agendas.  Not anymore.  Just about everywhere you look in media and advertising people are talking green and sustainability.

One unfortunate side effect of having meaningful words become marketing buzzwords is that what these words mean and represent is often lost in a barrage of advertising and shallow quasi-news reporting.

The words sustainable and sustainability are powerful words with meaning that reveals great wisdom for the future of humankind.  It is important that we preserve the power of these words to help us understand what we must do to provide a high quality of life in the years ahead.  It would be tragic to be seduced by the spin doctors that because we put a green or sustainable label on something that we are properly addressing our long-term challenges.

Problem:  Coal burning power plants produce much of the electricity used in the world today.  The burning of coal releases a variety of pollutants into the air.

Solution:  Modern advances in coal processing, new innovations in how coal is used and improvements in the efficiency of coal burning power plants greatly reduce how much coal is used to produce a watt of electricity and how many emissions are produced from the burning of that coal.

The following article was reprinted from the National Energy Technology Laboratory’s website.  NETL is a division of the US Department of Energy.

Coal Becomes a Future Fuel

Rising high above a reclaimed phosphate strip mine in southern Florida is a preview of coal's future.  Within the gleaming steel towers of Tampa Electric Co.'s Polk Power Station, near Lakeland, Florida, are the latest – and to date, one of the most technologically advanced – of a series of innovations that make the plant one of the cleanest and most efficient coal plants operating anywhere in the world.

Many of these innovations can trace their engineering roots back a quarter century or more. In fact, for much of coal's modern history, technological progress has been defined by efforts to reduce pollutants released when coal is burned.