CCS

Climate campaigner talks to the coal conference organiser

Update: Now with video.

Well, it's all been going on at our barricade of the government / coal industry shindig. This morning, an interested - and vaguely familiar looking - passer-by stopped to have a chinwag with with the volunteers chained to the barricades. After a 10 minute chat about climate change, coal, and climate change's impacts on disease migration, the passer-by wished everyone luck and wandered off.

E.ON is arguing for its new coal plant on the basis that it will include carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. So, is CCS is a silver bullet? Or is it just another false solution, touted by an industry desperately trying to stay relevant in a carbon constrained world?

CCS is a means of separating out carbon dioxide when burning fossil fuels, and then dumping it - underground, or else at or under the sea bed.

CCS isn't commercially viable; there are no commercially operating CCS plants in the world. And for all the industry's obfuscation, the new plant at Kingsnorth won't be able to capture and store carbon; it will just be ready to incorporate CCS should the technology ever become viable in the future.