Dirty Coal: Back of the napkin calculations on the cost of clean coal 'branding' research at our university, vs how much they spend on lobbying against clean air, water, and better climate in DC

Updated 9/1/18.  The student newspaper reports that Peabody Energy has given the university 1.5 million dollars in support of the so-called 'Consortium for Clean Coal Utilization.'   Most of that research is on carbon capture, not to help the climate, but to market CO2 to oil and gas producers so they can produce more oil and gas (this is called secondary or 'enhanced' recovery of oil and gas).  With many millions of dollars spent and now well over ten years of work, we have heard of no major break through on coal, much less have they discovered 'clean coal' a scientific impossibility.   How is that good for the earth?  Although Peabody's former CEO left the board of trustees, Peabody's recent donation to the university might mean that the new CEO may come on board.  That would be farcical, and very bad news for the university.  Peabody is struggling against their bad reputation in the city, and their financial woes (high debt, shrinking coal markets).  They even had to give up their naming rights of the city opera house.  Word has it that they are also spreading 'clean coal' propaganda at the St. Louis Cardinals' baseball games.  What this means, most problematically, is that Washington University is doing little more than advertising, through lies, for a coal company on its last legs.

Updated 6/6/17.  The other so-called 'clean coal' (CCS) power plant that is often mentioned is Southern Co./Mississippi Power's  Kemper plant.  It has been nothing but a boondoggle.  Billions have been spent, the coal is not clean (it can't be), and like all coal burning plants it has "ongoing challenges over ash removal and gas cleanup".   Coal will never be clean.  The Chancellor and the coal companies talk about helping poor people with 'clean coal', but it will never be economically viable either.

Updated 3/31/16.  In July of 2015 (video below) the IEA chief Van der Houven goes on and on about the success of CCS technology at SaskPower in Canada, promulgating the myth of successful 'clean coal' technologies.  But read this report in the New York Times from 3/31/16. Not only is Sask Power a very expensive failure, but there is plenty of malfeasance and misrepresentation going on.  Sounds suspicious to say the least.

Updated 3/29/16, after watching the van der Hoeven presentation from last summer, some notes below. Basically a pro-fossil fuels 'technological fix' discourse.  Clear why she was invited and got softball questions from a pro-fossil fuels, technological fix audience.

Original post: March 27, 2016 My source notes on the lecture for tomorrow, the part about 'What are they calling clean coal'?  We don't know the details because the university has refused to disclose them.  That alone is a bit dirty...

What kind of research are they calling “clean coal”?

“Consortium for Clean Coal Utilization” founded, with statements by Chancellor Wrighton and Greg Boyce, 2008. $5 million dollars each from Ameren, Peabody Coal, and Arch Coal, paid over 5 years = $3 million per year for naming rights. The students demanded access to the contract which forces the university to speak in a certain way, but it was never disclosed. (In 2008, Peabody also ramped up its lobbying against climate science and cleaner air policy in DC. It spent more than 8 million alone on lobbying in 2008, approximately $30,000,000 between 2008 and 2015.  Ameren spent over 3 million in 2008 on lobbying; Arch about 3 million in 2008 and 2009, over 8 million by 2015.  University ethics, it appears, are cheaper than DC lobbyists and politicians). 

So rough calculation of things the coal industry (Arch, Ameren, and Peabody) bought in the past few years...

WUSTL betrayal of public trust (2008-2013)  = $15,000,000.    

Anti-public health lobbyists  (2008-2015)  = approx. $40,000,000

Coal burning research at WUSTL today

CCS research at WUSTL here.  And: http://cleancoal.wustl.edu. And here. Advertising brochure (2015). 

The latest spectacle

IEA Chief Maria van der Hoeven speaks on carbon capture at WUSTL (July 2015), Chancellor Wrighton recognizes Peabody “I would like to note the special role that Peabody has played in bringing her to St. Louis...” ... “a great corporation headquartered here in St. Louis and they extended the invitation” (and paid?) and recognizes Peabody execs in the audience.  Maria Van Der Hoeven says, at one point, [coal] has “also done almost irreparable damage to our global climate.”  And, existing carbon emissions would be “50 gigatons” by 2050, about three times more than what we need to stay below 2 degrees. But, she goes on to make a case for CCS and “clean coal,” that pretty much imagines something that seems pretty much impossible, clinging to fossil fuels. Watch it for yourself:

Local coverage.  Consortium celebrates with Peabody and Arch Coal, a new round of undisclosed amount of funding til 2020 (July 2015). Ameren is in or out? We don't know, but their name is still on the websites.

US DOE is funding ‘clean coal’? Well, no.

Most recent government-funded research is how to burn coal differently and make it less inefficient, since it is very inefficient now. Recently Wash U got 990K from DOE to build an experimental unit that might reveal how to capture more SOx and NOx. There is nothing in any of this research about “clean coal”.  Meanwhile, industry fighting tooth and nail against Clean Power Act, tighter controls on mercury, etc. etc.  

Students mobilize against Peabody and greenwashing. Remembering when the Students protested against corporate greenwashing:  Wash U Students Against Peabody (Spring 2014). And meanwhile, the struggle continues: Wash U Students Against Peabody