Saturday, June 16, 2007

Obama Faces Coal Backlash

"It turns out Democratic presidential aspirant and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama has more in common with the U.S. Air Force than the Natural Resources Defense Council or Moveon.org when it comes to solving America's dependence on foreign oil."

"I
llinois ranks as the nation's seventh-leading coal producer, according to the Department of Energy. Nearly 32 million tons of Illinois coal were mined in 2005, generating nearly $1 billion in gross revenue, according to the Illinois Department of Commerce."

Coal Gets Greens Red in the Face

"In a nutshell, CTL is worse than conventional fuels," says Elizabeth Martin Perera, climate policy specialist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, a not-for-profit organization. "CTL has higher life-cycle CO2 emissions than conventional fuels, even with carbon capture and storage."

"Without mentioning Obama by name, MoveOn.org, a powerful Democratic grass-roots organization, sent an email to members on Monday declaring: "The Senate is about to vote on a big bill dealing with energy and the climate crisis. Massive subsidies for coal were defeated in committee. But we're not out of the woods yet, since one of the coal-friendly senators could sneak them back in again as an amendment just before the final vote."'

From TheStreet.com