Chinese visit

#8, Yes we have abundance of coal in this country, however unless we embrace clean coal technology this resource will remain unclaimed. The Uk is looking at the possibility of burning the coal underground and extracting the gasses that way as it's far cleaner, however this requires Gov support which at this point is not forthcoming because of cost. All of Europe, America, Australia etc need to find a way to burn coal cleanly. Either at the power stations which requires highly effective scrubbers [they remove sulphur & many other contaminants] or as John says finding a way to burn the coal underground and extract the gas for use in the power stations. It should be noted the UK and all other European countries have signed up to an accord which binds them to provide 20% of their total power generated by renewables ie, onshore/offshore wind turbines, hydro, solar power and bio-mass, by doing that they receive large grants . There is a move away from coal, Drax Power Station which formally burned 5 million tonnes of coal per annum, now burns 12 million tonnes of bio-mass [woodchip] instead.

Although China is the biggest producer of coal in the world, [3 billion tonnes per year] it also imports 2 billion tonnes to burn in it's power stations. Unfortunately it doesn't have the emissions controls that we in the West adhere to hence the huge pollution problem. We have to consider it has the second biggest economy of the world and within the next five years will become the largest.

HI All.
Why is it that when China is mentioned such as the State visit to Britain it always comes with headlines of it's human rights tag. The news last night said that Russia has killed 300 civilians in air raids over Syria, which has upset the Americans, who killed around 250,000 civilians in Iraq plus how many in Syria. If we discuss China we have to admit that they have made huge steps in their human rights, in a country so vast and with such a huge population, a population that suffered so badly in the war. If a human rights tag is to be attached to any country it should be to Japan for it's human rights during the war for which they have never ever apologized.
Cheers Des

Coal can be burned very cleanly at the correct temperature and there is a method of carbon capture that can be used with it. Problem is the politicians, they are swayed by new technology because they think that by using it votes will come their way. In the end they will stuff it all up and no one will be the winner.
As to nuclear waste, most power plants produce waste about the size of a house brick each year. Here in Oz we take some and sore underground, we could take all of it from the world and still have room for more.