AP – The United States (US) committed to the idea of phasing out coal power plants, joining 56 other nations in kicking the coal habit that’s a huge factor in global warming.
US Special Envoy John Kerry announced that America was joining the Powering Past Coal Alliance, which means the Biden Administration commits to building no new coal plants and phasing out existing plants. No date was given for when the existing plants would have to go, but other Biden regulatory actions and international commitments already in the works had meant no coal by 2035.
“We will be working to accelerate unabated coal phase-out across the world, building stronger economies and more resilient communities,” Kerry said in a statement. “The first step is to stop making the problem worse: stop building new unabated coal power plants.”
Coal power plants have already been shutting down across the nation due to economics, and no new coal facilities were in the works, so “we were heading to retiring coal by the end of the decade anyway”, said climate analyst Alden Meyer of the European think-tank E3G. That’s because natural gas and renewable energy are cheaper, so it was market forces, he said.
As of October, just under 20 per cent of the US electricity is powered by coal, according to the US Department of Energy. The amount of coal burned in the US last year is less than half what it was in 2008.
Coal produces about 96 kilogrammes (kg) of heat-trapping carbon dioxide per million BTUs of energy produced, compared to natural gas which produces about 53kg and gasoline which is about 71kg.
