Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a necessity to stop global warming. However, it will not work if the power plants are allowed to burn coal as no CCS technology captures more than about 80% of the emitted CO2. Global warming will continue as long as we emit CO2 so a reduction in emissions will not prevent a coming climate catastrophe just postpone its timing.

What could be done is to convert existing coal power plants to multi-fuel plants that burn biomass, natural gas and trash. Also these converted coal power plants should go from providing base load electricity to mostly function as peak load power plants. Base load should be provided by wind power as this is the cheapest non-polluting power source that is capable of delivering over 50% of the needed electricity in any country on the planet. There is more economically exploitable wind energy in most countries than these countries will ever need. The same is not true for hydropower or geothermal power and solar power will always be more expensive than wind power.

The converted coal power plants should use CCS so that they can become 100% CO2 neutral as a large part of what they burn is biomass that during its growth removes the residual 20% of CO2 from the atmosphere. This solution is viable unlike CCS for coal power plants.

Sure, why not. The sooner we try it the sooner we'll prove that it either doesn't work at all or is more expensive than alternatives, and the sooner we will be forced to do useful things.

Henrik: I'm not convinced wind will always be cheaper than geothermal. If you're going to use wind extensively you have to include the cost of energy storage. Newer plasma drilling technologies could also lower the cost of geothermal significantly.

Geothermal and hydropower is often less costly than wind power so we should build as much of it as possible. What I did said is that many countries does not have enough geothermal and hydropower opportunities to make it truly important in the total power supply. This is for instance the case with the US where neither can supply over 50% of the power. Wind can so can solar but it is not economic compared to wind.

I think everyone agrees CCS technology is not ready yet, and there is too much CO2 in the air, and it will become worse, and we will have to take the CO2 out of the air eventually and we will have CCS technology in the future, and we are able to plant trees today. Since most of the CO2 captured today (by trees, which is actually the only implementable way to capture atmospheric carbon for a few decades) could be burned in CCS-powerplants within 20 years and sequestered forever, I think we should all agree that we should start planting trees wherever we can. The harvest can be done in 2030.
That's the cheepest way to capture carbon (and there are obviously some other nice side-effects) and the carbon can be sequestered permanently when these powerplants are ready. (Between harvesting the trees and burning the trees, the wood can be used intermetiately for something else, since that would also keep the CO2 out of the air. After some manipulation, you could even eat it, as long as you incinerate and sequester the sewage.)

Latest efforts to capture CO2 in Alberta is costing about $400/tonne. That's a lot of resources just to move CO2 from one place to another.

Wouldn't it be wiser and cheaper to develop more ways to reduce CO2 emissions in the first place.

Converting the older worst coal fired power plants to NG is not that expensive and could do a lot to reduce CO2 emissions. More Solar, Wind + Nuclear plants would do even better.

Coal may be better off left alone until such times as we know how to use it without polluting the globe.

What Chu proposes will cause the mother of all backdrafts for his Administration. CCS is clearly NOT viable or economical now or in the near future. Implementation of this wayward technology when the entire question of AGW is re-aligning is political suicide. The result will be the forcing into public knowledge energy formats that will eliminate fossil AND alternatives.

This is not what Mr. Chu or the established energy industry wants. Extremely low cost energy threatens many - and it will arrive sooner if schemes like CCS, Cap n' trade are forced on the populous.

@Henrik

...and solar power will always be more expensive than wind power.

Never say 'always'...who knows what future breakthrough might make PV solar the cheapest energy source around. Wind machines are have a lot of moving parts, after all.

CCS is seen as overhead, it does not make money, it costs money. Find a use for the carbon that makes money and it might be received with more positive attention.

@SJC:

Carbon emissions incur a cost that the emitter is currently avoiding. If the true costs of power sources were incurred, coal would be shunned and wind would be king.

Alain,
(Between harvesting the trees and burning the trees, the wood can be used immediately for something else, since that would also keep the CO2 out of the air.

Well heeled yuppies are commissioning designer furniture pieces (art works) that could be around in 400 years time.
Not that this will be cost effective anytime soon? (joking)

The product needs to be economical to produce, ie lumber, have a maximum utility time, highest benefit,low est power requirement and low environmental footprint, say forest (fire, or other) salvage. End of life disposal or reuse following these same criteria.

That is a viable approach.

Compared to CCS not much utility from CCS.

I would like to see some of this money spent on compressed air energy storage, a potential production leveling method for the intermittency of solar and wind. Along with grid smart appliances this may allow these non carbon emitting energy sources to contribute the majority of our electricity. There is some overlap in the technologies since both CCS and CAES require gas compression, heat removal and large, underground reservoirs.

Nick

You are right I should not say always since we don’t know what tomorrow brings. However, in all likelihood wind power will continue to be cheaper since one watt of installed wind power capacity cost about 1.3 USD installed onshore and it will have a capacity factor of about 0.3. A typical solar panel cost 5 USD per installed watt of capacity (3 USD for the panel and 2 USD for installing the panel) and it has a capacity factor of 0.15. In other words, when we adjust the cost of solar power for its lower capacity factor it cost about 10 USD per installed watt compared to 1.3 USD for wind power. Solar panels and installation cost will drop in price in the near future but it will be very unlikely that they drop more than down to 50 cents per watt for the panel and 1 USD for the installation. That is 1.5 USD per watt installed and 3 USD per watt when adjusted for the lower capacity factor. This is still much more expensive than onshore wind power and we have not even considered the cost of land used for installation or that wind power also has a potential for lowering its installation cost to probably 50 cents per installed watt in 20 years from now when carbon fiber blades and superconductor generators have become the standard.

I still see a large market for solar panels integrated in the building materials of new buildings, boats and vehicles. Here the installation cost could be nearly eliminated and there is no extra cost for land use either.

Henrik--

Agree. Wind scales up well, not down. For homeowners wanting to generate their own energy, PV solar is a viable option, while wind may not be due to zoning, etc. Integration of PV solar (not to mention solar hot water!!) into new construction ought to be a no-brainer for places like CA, AZ, etc. At the same time, large-scale wind farms in the wind-swept desert Southwest and off the CA/OR/WA coast also seem like a no-brainer.

The most effective and cheapest way (in the long run) to sequester carbon and storage is to leave coal on the ground and use renewable energy like solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, wave, tidal, etc.

That 4 billion USD can find better use on making long-distance power transmission lines to conduct wind electricity from the Great Planes to the rest of the country. May be T Boone Pickens or the likes will invest some of his (their) own billions to install wind turbines. This will be a much more productive Gov-Private venture/partnership!

Roger:

Amen!

Nick,

I know all about externalized costs, this not a new concept. However, to the investor/developer, this does not MAKE money. I am not advocating anything, but if you want to succeed, it is best NOT to swim upstream. Find a way that they can make money on the CO2 and they will be more likely to go along, that is common sense.

By the time these chumps waste the money we will be certain that carbon doesn't change the climate but a tiny amount.

The Science of the 21st century keeps turning up new advances, and many other ways that the Sun itself alters the climate through means the IPCC never dreamed of. Each time it does so, it reduces the influence of Carbon in the atmosphere as a Global
Warming agent. By then we will have gone as long on a cooling Earth as we did in the almost two decades of Global Warming, that was merely a cyclical ocean swing, that stopped 11 years ago.

Then we can forget the whole thing. Everyone will call it what it was, a false alarm. And a global hoax.

"By the time these chumps waste the money..."

Stan, thank you for your uplifting and inspirational comments...NOT. The old saying is that if you have nothing good to say, then don't say anything at all. Perhaps that applies here as well.

"By the time these chumps waste the money..."

Well, certainly $4B spent on CCS is not money well-spent. Sure hope that your global cooling prediction will come true, Stan, for the sakes of humanity. Meanwhile, the top priority now is environmental preservation by avoiding burning of coal and energy sustainability for the future.

If the people think that $4 billion is a waste for this, they will let their feelings known in a big way. Iraq costs more than this every two weeks for the last 6 1/2 years (> 300 weeks or > 150 times more) with nothing to show for it.