idiots War on Coal - Page 3 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Angel · #31 05-22-2012, 10:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by elchivito

Burning coal is a leading cause of smog, acid rain, global warming, and air toxics. In an average year, a typical coal plant generates:
3,700,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), the primary human cause of global warming--as much carbon dioxide as cutting down 161 million trees.

10,000 tons of sulfur dioxide (SO2), which causes acid rain that damages forests, lakes, and buildings, and forms small airborne particles that can penetrate deep into lungs.

500 tons of small airborne particles, which can cause chronic bronchitis, aggravated asthma, and premature death, as well as haze obstructing visibility.

10,200 tons of nitrogen oxide (NOx), as much as would be emitted by half a million late-model cars. NOx leads to formation of ozone (smog) which inflames the lungs, burning through lung tissue making people more susceptible to respiratory illness.

720 tons of carbon monoxide (CO), which causes headaches and place additional stress on people with heart disease.

220 tons of hydrocarbons, volatile organic compounds (VOC), which form ozone.

170 pounds of mercury, where just 1/70th of a teaspoon deposited on a 25-acre lake can make the fish unsafe to eat.

225 pounds of arsenic, which will cause cancer in one out of 100 people who drink water containing 50 parts per billion.

114 pounds of lead, 4 pounds of cadmium, other toxic heavy metals, and trace amounts of uranium.

Source: union of concerned scientists

Nothing wrong here, nosiree.

I can only refute one of your numbers, because I am not at a place where I can look at the stack monitoring software. Sorry that I only remember one value:

170lbs of Hg ? no way. how about 9. I did the math off of our EPA-certified emissions monitoring gear (every station has such). It was a single boiler, scrubbed, 1400MW, built in the late 80's, running about 80% of the year and a (conservative) heat rate of 10,000btu/MW and it put 9lbs of mercury out the stack in the last year.

-John

MS Fowler · #32 05-23-2012, 07:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Angel

I can only refute one of your numbers, because I am not at a place where I can look at the stack monitoring software. Sorry that I only remember one value:

170lbs of Hg ? no way. how about 9. I did the math off of our EPA-certified emissions monitoring gear (every station has such). It was a single boiler, scrubbed, 1400MW, built in the late 80's, running about 80% of the year and a (conservative) heat rate of 10,000btu/MW and it put 9lbs of mercury out the stack in the last year.

-John

You infer that someone with a political agenda would fudge the numbers to make a point?
I'm shocked! Shocked to hear there is manipulatin' going on around here.

MTI · #33 05-23-2012, 08:21 AM

There are Ohio coal power plants that are closed or closing due to environmental issues. I take iit that John does not work at one of them.

elchivito · #34 05-23-2012, 10:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Angel

I can only refute one of your numbers, because I am not at a place where I can look at the stack monitoring software. Sorry that I only remember one value:

170lbs of Hg ? no way. how about 9. I did the math off of our EPA-certified emissions monitoring gear (every station has such). It was a single boiler, scrubbed, 1400MW, built in the late 80's, running about 80% of the year and a (conservative) heat rate of 10,000btu/MW and it put 9lbs of mercury out the stack in the last year.

-John

They're not my numbers, only some I found. Never the less, perhaps they're averages. Would you assert that your 9 pounds of Hg is typical, or an outlier?

MTI · #35 05-23-2012, 10:08 AM

I'm much more curious about the carbon dioxide.

Txjake · #36 05-23-2012, 10:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spdrun

The coal industry should have been left in the 19th century where it belongs. Good on Obama on trying to euthanize it.

mommy & daddy must pay your bills, if you think this is a good thing...

Txjake · #37 05-23-2012, 10:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spdrun

Americans have had 50 years to move away from fossil fuels, yet they and their "leaders" stupidly chose not to. I don't have much compassion for the average American, no. Maybe if their sorry asses freeze in the dark, they'll become more accepting of clean forms of energy like wind, hydro, or nuclear.

since you claim to live in NYC, then I expect your neighbors will be some of those freezing in the dark. Have a good time and lets us know how it goes...

Botnst · #38 05-23-2012, 12:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MTI

I'm much more curious about the carbon dioxide.

Don't hold your breath.

Angel · #39 05-23-2012, 01:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by elchivito

They're not my numbers, only some I found. Never the less, perhaps they're averages. Would you assert that your 9 pounds of Hg is typical, or an outlier?

Most coal plants are 300 to 1400 MW - mine is on the high end

Which means its a bit more thermally efficient (compared to other scrubbed units) and would tend to make less Hg per megawatt, but if you count megawatts per day, then it'd be more becuase 1400MW plants consume more coal than 300MW plants.

Full disclosure - (I looked this up) we are normally permitted for 19,500t of NOx, (NO and NO2 per year) that is more than the UCS number- sucks being an engineer sometimes. I have no idea if we actually hit that or not (I'm an electrical engineer and dont need coal to keep a job

but I think that NOx is the easy one to stay under if you are a scrubbed plant)

Call me heartless, but I am cool with the trade-off - from what I can tell, my plant alone powers all of Hamilton County (the county the Cincinnati, Ohio resides on)- 850k people including businesses, industry and a few plug-in electric cars

I am ok with the trade. Tell me how many people 19,500t of NOx will poison or kill in a year (I know its more than 0 and someone has a guess)

Even more brutal honesty - most coal plants run 20 to 30 years between large overhauls. In the next few years, large overhauls of coal plants will be economically impossible for just about anyone (so why bother trying to force them ?) I sit in my cushy cubicle and fault the lawyers and business majors that run companies full of large equipment

Actually, I have a DCS to install...

-John

panZZer · #40 05-23-2012, 02:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MTI

How clean is "Clean Coal?" Under current technologies, to capture and control the CO2 that's produced requires 25% more energy to run the process and then you have to bury the byproduct of the capture, much like any other toxic waste or spent radioactive fuels.

yes --this "clean Coal" howler should read about the KY town that was washed away by coal slurry from a big dirty coal co's holding lake--they do this $hit all over appalachia.

spdrun · #41 05-23-2012, 02:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Txjake

since you claim to live in NYC, then I expect your neighbors will be some of those freezing in the dark. Have a good time and lets us know how it goes...

NY region is about 10% coal, 20 hydro, 30 nuclear and natural gas in turn, with the last 10 being oil and renewable. There's also lots of room for conservation -- plenty of older buildings run lights 24/7 whereas outside the US the lights would be on timers or motion sensors. Not to mention that non-thermostatic heating systems are ubiquitous, sadly.

If coal went away, local energy prices wouldn't be affected a lot. Plus, part of my business involves consulting for energy mgmt companies, so it would improve my bottom line.

Pooka · #42 05-23-2012, 03:54 PM

If you would please refer to the original posting you will see that the prices being bandied about are not prices for electricity. They are 'Market-Clearing Prices' which is something quite different.

When ENRON blew up few people in the Energy business were shocked. No one could figure out what they did to make money so it was a sure thing the books were being cooked somewhere. We all got a quick lesson in the whole Market-Clearing Price thing so we would not get crushed by it.

So what is the 'Market-Clearing Price' that the original posting refers to and seems so sure is the end of the world for the US? It is the price paid for the last bit of electricity used by a power company when buying from another power company. All power companies contract for energy from other companies to meet demand and when you exceed your contract you can buy more power but it cost more than the contract price. LOTS more. That's because you are not paying the going cost; you are paying the Market-Clearing Price.

In our case we would buy power at X, but if we exceeded our monthly demand the price for the last bit of power was something like X ten times over. Sometimes it was twenty times over the normal price. Even I could not exceed demand without approval from higher-ups since we were talking about real money even for a major oil company, and I could drop a million bucks before anyone started asking what I was spending it on.

So the auction the original posing was talking about was how much would companies pay for power that exceeded their normal demand and not how much would they pay of electricity. In other words..... The article is not false but it is misleading by a factor that could be described as close to Market-Clearing Prices.

And how did ENRON figure into all of this? They would sell power to a company in California from several out of state producers they owned. When a power buyer in California had purchased all of their contracted power from one plant they would switch to buying from another. ENRON would then order that plant shut-down, forcing the California buyer to revert to the original supplier. But now they had to pay Market-Clearing Prices because they had exceeded their demand for the month. ENRON was now selling the same power for about 20 times the contract price and until the contracts expired there was nothing the buyer could do about it.

Nice work if you can get it.

And, uh, Obama has nothing to do with this just like Bush had nothing to do with ENRON. Sorry.

Pooka · #43 05-23-2012, 04:51 PM

And......

The current Market-Clearing Price for electricity in Texas, a place run by Republicans and ruled for the last 18 years by a combination of Bush and Perry, is currently capped at $3,000 per megawatt.

The Republicans there are currently trying to get this raised to $4,500 per megawatt but they are running into opposition from the Public Utilities Board which is one part of the Texas Government that Republicans do not control.

Perry has whined that another ENRON cannot take place but has never said why. He has just given his word which is really not worth much these days even in Texas.

And due to an abundance of wind power, which the Republicans in Texas have fought against for years, the wholesale price of power has dropped to as low as $0.00 (zero dollars) recently. When the wind is blowing hard enough the wind farms can make a lot of power, and the wholesale price in Texas is set by whomever can make it the cheapest.

MS Fowler · #44 05-23-2012, 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by panZZer

yes --this "clean Coal" howler should read about the KY town that was washed away by coal slurry from a big dirty coal co's holding lake--they do this $hit all over appalachia.

Old stuff. I don't believe its done this way anymore. Back when Carter was in office, there was a devastating, killer coal refuse embankment tragedy. As a result the Army Corps of Engineers required stability analysis for all small dams--existing and proposed. I was sent to a Coal company client in Grundy, Va to drill 200-250 foot deep holes and place special casing in the holes. We then ran an inclinometer down the holes, and could see if the pile of coal refuse was moving or stable. Lots of good engineering work.
If un-engineered embankments exist today, somebody is falling down on the job.

Coal refuse is anything they pull from a coal mine that is not of sufficient quality to be sold. The old way of disposing of it was to truck it up a "hollar" and dump it. Later they used aerial trams to dump it more quickly. The problem is that the dumped spoil eventually start to retain water. With no engineering to handle the water, it eventually has more mass than the pile of coal holding it back. When that happens, the whole thing slides down the valley, destroying everything in its path--usually with no warning. It was a bad practice. AFAIK, it was eliminated during the 1970s.

spdrun · #45 05-23-2012, 06:31 PM

And by '70s, you mean 2000s:

Martin County sludge spill - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I think there was another slurry spill ca. 2008.