Published by Martha Danly under Green Living

Taking on ‘clean coal,’ one of today’s most powerful greenwashing efforts, requires massive intelligence and clout. Enter the Reality Coalition.

The Reality Coalition has come out swinging hard against clean coal, which they frame as the coal industry’s attempt to convince the American public that clean coal is safe, affordable, and just around the corner. The coalition is spearheaded by the nonprofit Alliance for Climate Protection and joined by such environmental bigwigs as the Sierra Club, the National Wildlife Federation, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the League of Conservation Voters.

What is clean coal, exactly? Coined by the coal industry and used rhetorically by politicians, it is an umbrella term for a range of efforts intended to reduce the environmental impact and increase the efficiency of coal extraction, burning, and waste.

The most prominent clean coal method currently under discussion is carbon capture and storage, in which power plants theoretically would extract 85 percent or more of their carbon dioxide emissions and sequester them underground forever. Three other approaches to clean coal include chemically removing minerals and impurities from coal before it’s burned (known as scrubbing), converting coal into carbon monoxide and hydrogen by combining it with oxygen and/or steam at high temperatures (known as gasification), and using steam to remove sulphur dioxide from flue gases.

So clean coal is a concept, not a succinct reality.

What is the greenwashing about? These are among the main arguments against clean coal as an immediate, viable solution to our energy needs:

• Clean coal is not here yet. Commercially scalable solutions for carbon capture and storage are at least 10-15 years away, too distant to have the immediate impact needed to slow down and reverse the impact of greenhouse gases on climate change.
• Clean coal will not be widespread. Only a small portion of coal-fired energy plants is slated to use clean coal technology.
• The cost of clean coal is unknown. Because clean coal is not fully developed, the true cost and actual return are unknown. Therefore, it can’t be validly weighed today as an economic alternative.
• Clean coal is risky. Even if the immediate costs could be calculated, the long-term risk of sequestering carbon dioxide is too high. Where and how will we store it and guarantee that it never leaks into the environment?
• Coal extraction itself is an environmental hazard. Whether the coal is clean or dirty, coal extraction is harmful. Consider last December’s nightmarish sludgefest, the largest fly-ash spill ever, that occurred at the Kingston Fossil Plant in Tennessee.

With these facts in mind, how can we say that coal might ever be clean enough, relative to renewable energies such as geothermal, biomass, solar, wind and hydroelectric power?

That’s exactly the stance of the Reality Coalition’s ad campaign to fight greenwashing by the coal industry. The Reality Coalition says that now is the time call in the big guns and alert the public. Enter Crispin Porter + Bogusky.

By combining forces with the Boulder, Colorado, ad agency, the Reality Coalition has added another weapon to its arsenal. CP+B was behind the “Truth” anti-smoking campaign, which became a social marketing classic in 2000, when one of their ads featured teens unloading 1,200 body bags in front of tobacco giant Philip Morris’ New York headquarters.

At this point we could use a little wit. And speaking of body bags, cue the Coen brothers.

CB+B recruited Joel and Ethan Coen, the creators of beloved films such as “Raising Arizona,” “Fargo,” “O Brother, Where Art Thou,” and “Burn After Reading,” to direct a series of TV ads exposing the fallacy of clean coal. The ads urge consumers to educate themselves at the Reality website, which puts forth a series of simple, well-documented statements from respected authorities as to why clean coal is a pipe dream. The idea is to fight bad PR with good PR.

Released last week, here’s Reality’s first Coen brothers TV ad spoofing an air-freshener commercial.

Coen Brothers TV ad parody for Clean Coal Clean – Air Freshener

Now for the staying power. There’s a whole campaign in the works — here’s another ad in the making, a parody of a laundry-detergent commercial.

The Making of the Coen brothers’ Clean Coal Clean Ad – Laundry Detergent

With the drumbeat of Reality messages now in the air, let’s look at the source of clean coal greenwashing. It comes primarily from the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), a consortium of 48 coal producers, power producers, and transportation companies whose combined profits in 2007 were $57 billion.

To influence consumers, the ACCCE spent an estimated $45 million on advertising last year to pitch the actuality/advantageousness of clean coal, according to Sierra Club’s Josh Dorner. To influence congress, the coal and electric utility industries spent $125 million in the first nine months of 2008 in lobbying against alternative energy and a required cap on global warming pollution.

Sponsored by the ACCCE, the AmericasPower.org website brims with alleged facts and figures about how much coal we use and its putative importance to our current way of life. This is pitched as heart-warming stuff about maintaining the status quo.

Unfortunately for the cause of truth, some of the material offered is downright misleading. For example, the website avers that coal is 77% cleaner than it was in 1970. Most people would glance at the chart and take away the message that coal pollution is practically a thing of the past. Examine the fine print and you’ll see that carbon dioxide, which makes up 82% of all greenhouse gas emissions, is left out of the calculation.

I got to wondering, what is the mindset of the ACCCE? How long have these people been drinking their own Kool-aid, and do they have any appreciation of the American public’s intelligence? My sense is: a) far too long, and b) not at all.

As evidence, take a look at this clip from a December 2008 Rachel Maddow show on MSNBC about clean coal, during which she aired a holiday animation from the ACCCE website. Happy lumps of animated, disembodied clean coal are shown chirruping Christmas carols with pro-clean-coal lyrics. Trust me, this is more than a moment of Zen.

Rachel Maddow show – Maddow on the Myth of “Clean Coal,” Dec 11, 2008

But over and above the issue of greenwashers and lobbyists, the elephant in the room is the question as to why President Barack Obama, of all people, stands behind clean coal at all. Is he simply taking a portfolio approach to energy policy, managing risk by investing in a wide range of options? When will he and his advisors wake up and balance the portfolio appropriately, forcing clean coal proponents to fight for resources based on its likely return on investment?

In the meantime, I thank the Reality campaign for bringing us the straight facts about the American coal industry. It is combating the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that have been planted by the promoters of clean coal to reinforce ignorance. People who are unaware of the truth about clean coal are prone to cling to erroneous statements such as these:

“Coal is a great domestic alternative to foreign oil; we have plenty of it.”
“We’ll lose too many jobs if we reduce coal production.”
“The coal industry is making its best efforts to protect the environment.”
“I’m no expert; the coal people must know what will work.”
“We put a man on the moon; why can’t we sequester carbon?”

Simply put: given the choice, I choose Reality.