Twenty seven years ago, on this day, October 11th, 1999,
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has opened the competition for companies to begin designing a new type of energy facility that could change public perceptions about fossil fuel fired power plants. DOE will initially offer as much as $30 million to qualified projects.
Anon. 1999. DoE sets sights on clean burning fossil fuel power plants. Coal Week, Vol 25, no. 41, 11 October.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 368ppm. As of 2026, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context was that the Kyoto Protocol had been negotiated in December 1997. Various nations had signed, but not yet ratified, and therefore attention was beginning to turn to so-called “clean coal”, because many nations were industrial nations still dependent on coal, and everything that could make it “cleaner” was a good thing. Of course, the language of clean coal has been around since, well, at least the early 70s, and looking to think of those Wall Street Journal adverts, but also further back.
What I think we can learn from this is that we’re smart enough to figure out how to find and burn carboniferous ego energy, so sources, we’re smart enough to figure out that that is going to cause mayhem, we’re not smart enough to figure out how to get ourselves off the fossil fuels and therefore, mayhem is locked in.
What happened next. All the clean coal bullshit got upgraded as various carbon capture and storage – CCS – strategies and proposals, and sequestration leadership forums and bold announcements about money that would be spent, Futuregen
And what do we have to show for it? Half of fuck all.
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
Xx
References
xx
You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
If you want to get involved, let me know.
If you want to invite me on your podcast, that would boost my ego and probably improve the currently pitiful hit-rate on this site (the two are not-unrelated).
Also on this day:
October 11, 2006 – “Climate Institute” begins tour of rural Victoria – All Our Yesterdays
October 11, 2016 – Five activists do a shutdown on a tar sands pipeline – All Our Yesterdays