Natural Resources Canada
2008/26
April 23, 2008
The Government of Canada Invests in Carbon Capture and Storage in Nova Scotia
HALIFAX – The Honourable Gary Lunn, Minister of Natural Resources, announced today that the Government of Canada will provide $5 million to support carbon capture and storage (CCS) research in the province of Nova Scotia.
"Canada's fossil fuel resources are one of our country's biggest economic drivers, but we must find cleaner ways to produce and use these resources," said Minister Lunn. "With our world-leading carbon capture and storage technology that supports our balanced approach to fight climate change, we can achieve our goals in a way that is good for the environment and the economy."
According to the report of the Canada–Alberta ecoENERGY CCS Task Force, CCS technology could allow Canada to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 600 million tonnes a year by 2050 – an amount equal to almost three-quarters of Canada's current annual emissions.
The potential for underground storage of carbon dioxide in Western Canada is already well known. The new funding from the Government of Canada will be used to assess whether similar CCS opportunities can be developed in Nova Scotia, where coal-fired generating stations supply some three-quarters of the province's electricity.
"We need to know if carbon capture and storage represents a practical tool to protect the environment," said Richard Hurlburt, Nova Scotia's Minister of Energy. "Nova Scotia has some of the best researchers in the country – and now they have funding to find out."
The Government of Canada's contribution to the research was included in Budget 2008 and will be delivered in trust, once legislation has been passed.
...
http://www.nrcan-rncan.gc.ca/media/newcom/2008/200826-eng.php
Stumble It!
Now I wonder how many of those researchers will turn that money away so they can do legitimate research? What do you think CM Burns and Rev Blair?
What an idea! By forcing the tax payer to fund this scheme, more polluting power plants can be built in Canada to power up the USA. The beauty is that these polluting power plants will be seen as "green", and the environmental disaster from pumping CO2 underground won't be noticed for many years down the road.
Now I wonder how many of those researchers will turn that money away so they can do legitimate research? What do you think CM Burns and Rev Blair?
I agree with almost everything you said but I haven't seen any evidence that an environmental disaster will ensue from underground storage of CO2. Nevertheless, I think the likelihood of such a disaster is fairly high.
Remember the three R's?
REDUCE
RE-USE
RECYCLE
They are prioritized that way for a reason.
Most of the world sees itself as stuck between a rock a hard place. With increased demand for energy and hydrocarbon energy sources unable to meet that demand coal will become a bigger player. Coal is filthy, dirty stuff and if we don't have some sort of solution online fast then we're going to look like England did up until the 60's.
December 12, 2002 · Fifty years ago this month, a toxic mix of dense fog and sooty black coal smoke killed thousands of Londoners in four days. It remains the deadliest environmental episode in recorded history.
The so-called killer fog is not an especially well-remembered event, even though it changed the way the world looks at pollution. Before the incident, people in cities tended to accept pollution as a part of life. Afterward, more and more, they fought to limit the poisonous side effects of the industrial age.
NPR's John Nielsen went to London to prepare two reports on the killer fog of 1952.
Funeral director Stan Cribb of T. Cribb and Sons has led thousands of funeral trains through the smoggy streets of London. But he says the 1952 event dwarfs all others he has seen. He remembers the moment he saw the first gray wisps:
"You had this swirling," Cribb recalls, "like somebody had set a load of car tires on fire."
Cribb was then a mortician's assistant, working for Tom Cribb, his elderly uncle. On Friday Dec. 5, they were driving to a wake, with a line of cars full of mourners close behind. Neither man knew a catastrophe was brewing. They didn't know that a mass of stagnant air had just clamped a lid over London, trapping the smoke from millions of residential coal fires at ground level.
Cribb remembers being stunned by the blackness of the gathering fog. After a few minutes he couldn't see the curb from his spot behind the wheel. After a few more minutes, Tom Cribb got out and started walking in front of the hearse, to keep his nephew on the road. He carried a powerful hurricane lantern in one hand, but it was useless.
"It's like you were blind," says Cribb.
Everyone in London walked blind for the next four days. By the time the smog blew off on Tuesday Dec. 9, thousands of Londoners were dead, and thousands more were about to die. Those who had survived no longer spoke of London's romantic pea-soup fog.
As the smoke coming out of London's chimneys mixed with natural fog, the air turned colder. Londoners heaped more coal on their fires, making more smoke. Soon it was so dark some said they couldn't see their feet.
By Sunday, Dec. 7, visibility fell to one foot.
Roads were littered with abandoned cars. Midday concerts were cancelled due to total darkness. Archivists at the British Museum found smog lurking in the book stacks. Cattle in the city's Smithfield market were killed and thrown away before they could be slaughtered and sold — their lungs were black.
On the second day of the smog, Saturday, Dec. 6, 500 people died in London. When the ambulances stopped running, thousands of gasping Londoners walked through the smog to the city's hospitals.
The lips of the dying were blue. Heavy smoking and chronic exposure to pollution had already weakened the lungs of those who fell ill during the smog. Particulates and acids in the killer brew finished the job by triggering massive inflammations. In essence, the dead had suffocated.
Some 900 more people died on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 1952. Then the wind swept in unexpectedly. The killer fog vanished as quickly as it had arrived.
In his 60 years as a mortician, Stan Cribb has only stopped two funeral trains. Once in the fog of '52, and once when Nazi warplanes bombed the road around him. In the blitz, 30,000 Londoners died. According a recent study in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, 12,000 may have been killed by the great smog.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... yId=873954
This soot reinforced fog is currently china's nightmare.
The smog of the GTA has nothing to do with CO2 but is cited as a motive for KYOTO.
Britain' pollution was so bad during that period and before that acid rain was literally eating the stonework of buildings. At one point rainwater had the PH of vinegar. Sulphur and CO2 are two very different materials.
This "carbon capture" thing is just more tin-foil hater nonsense to treat a non-existant problem. Scrubbers for SOX and NOX are necessary but CO2---dream on!
Secondly the plan is dumb, because it's based on the idea the planet is continuing to warm. There's reason to give us pause on that. We haven't seen any real global warming for 10 years. Ocean Oscillations happen in 30 year shifts. There's good science showing that shift has changed, and some science suggesting we may be switching into a cool period. Long periods between sun cycles suggest coming cold climate. We're still waiting for this current solar cycle to change, but it's already overdue. If there is not a repeat this summer of the cloudless arctic with freaky South blowing winds we saw last summer we may be given further reason to go hmmm...?
Basically if we invest billions in schemes like this one to control the climate, and by 2010 it becomes clear the climate is cooling all by itself we're going to look pretty stupid, plus we'll have a weaker economy, and will be less able deal with the very real and present (at that time) danger of a cooler climate.
I hope these projects work as intended.
That's the basic idea no doubt, to give the impression that pumping massive amounts of pollution into the atmosphere is a good idea so long as non toxic CO2 is somehow being stripped off and eliminated (for a while anyway).
No doubt that's the plan, to make burning cheap coal appear to be environmentally friendly when in fact it's not. Did you know that coal fired plants pump radioactive waste into the environment?
Coal Ash Is More Radioactive than Nuclear Waste
Doing something that you know nothing about that could be dangerous for a reason that may not even exist is just plain silly.
The way I see it, the idea is to find ways to profit from the global warming hysteria that's being promoted by various special interest groups - and finding ways they are.
I agree with almost everything you said but I haven't seen any evidence that an environmental disaster will ensue from underground storage of CO2. Nevertheless, I think the likelihood of such a disaster is fairly high.
Historical evidence clearly shows that whenever mankind disturbs the environment in unnatural ways, things tend to go bad. Pumping CO2 in to the earth is no doubt yet another idiotic man made disaster in the works. There are many more simple and benevolent ways to reduce pollution. One simple method is to stop powering the USA with Canada's energy reserves and use it only for domestic needs. Instead, what is being promoted is the exact opposite strategy.
Remember the three R's?
REDUCE
RE-USE
RECYCLE
They are prioritized that way for a reason.
What's being proposed is:
INCREASE
CONSUME
CONSUME SOME MORE
One point you may have missed, was with my question concerning if researchers would pass up the $5 million to do something more worthwhile with their time. The point being "No, of course they'll take the cash", which is exactly why there's so many scientists jumping on the well funded global warming band wagon.
That's the basic idea no doubt, to give the impression that pumping massive amounts of pollution into the atmosphere is a good idea so long as non toxic CO2 is somehow being stripped off and eliminated (for a while anyway).
No doubt that's the plan, to make burning cheap coal appear to be environmentally friendly when in fact it's not. Did you know that coal fired plants pump radioactive waste into the environment?
Coal Ash Is More Radioactive than Nuclear Waste
Doing something that you know nothing about that could be dangerous for a reason that may not even exist is just plain silly.
The way I see it, the idea is to find ways to profit from the global warming hysteria that's being promoted by various special interest groups - and finding ways they are.
Much of the other stuff likely could be pumped into the ground as well. Regardless, the issue needs addressed and this is potentially the best way to do it at this time without causing massive addition Cost.
The liberal fascists global warming scam continues....!!!!!
So does the "Con" Denialist Stupidity apparently.
Take "liberal" out of the above, and I'll agree with you.
I don't see how the global warming scam could be only a liberal scam, since it's being exploited and promoted by all political groups including those who claim otherwise. The real scam here, is that some people still think that there's an idealogical difference between political groups when in fact they are all working for the exact same corporations that fund them. The only real debate between political groups, is with how far should they push their masters wishes upon us.
There's blind denial but there's also blind acceptance.
No one is blindly denying that there's global warming going on, instead many people are legitimately pointing out that the global warming theory, specifically the one concerning CO2 emissions and the doomsday scenarios surrounding it, is standing on very shaky ground and appears to be yet another doomsday scam designed to create mass fear making the world a more pliable place for those who wish to push through an otherwise unpopular agenda.
The global warming scam is but one scam in a long line up of doomsday scams. Shall I remind you of the Cold War scam, the Bird Flue scam, the Year 2000 scam, the Global Cooling scam, the "Terrists" are Everywhere scam, the Saddam has WMD scam, and so on.
I would agree with several of you that there is a clear case of scam wrt to Global Warming going on here, and it's pretty blatant. Once you see past the half truths in the media, it's surprising how much mind control is going on.
I have read a bit on these issues since they are so dogmatically pushed at us as fact every day. I don't mean to bore anybody with facts, right off the bat, but here's some in point form:
-Earth has been experiencing increased volcanic activity this past decade. 70% of volcanoes are under water, hot lava heats up the oceans causing increased evaporation - more rain and snow. Warmer oceans melt ice
-Sun magnetic strength varies over time, which corresponds pretty much directly with temperatures here on Earth. Cities are artificially hot for several reasons, real temperatures on land should be measured away from them rurally. Hottest rural decade past century was the 1930's in NA, hottest year was 1936
-CO2 provides much needed 'greenhouse effect' in our atmosphere on the order of 6 degrees warming. Nothing humans do will affect this 6 degrees warming because of the huge and instantaneous role the oceans play in absorbing or releasing CO2 depending on their temperature. CO2 is part of the natural carbon cycle where trees and vegetation grow quicker with a higher concentration. CO2 has never been a pollutant, and plans to sequester it have got to be the stupidest thing you will ever hear of this century.
-Atmospheric CO2 levels on Earth have been as much as 17 times higher than the current 380ppm. If increased C02 causes warming, why did the Earth go in to an Ice Age at levels 10 times of today? A little bit of CO2 goes a long way, for giving us the 6 degrees warming. More CO2, a lot more may give us another degree. But since humans and our industry only give off 3% of the world's CO2 to begin with, this whole issue is a complete utter farce
-you can't tax a volcano, which along with bacteria dwarf human CO2 emissions