Legalectric

Here we go again, more misleading crap on “Carbon Capture and Storage,” as if it’s a happening thing… It’s NOT! Great Plains just announced its “Minnesota Carbon Capture Forum.” From the inbox:

Good grief, do we really need to go through this again? Come on, folks, start with this basic tome. You can’t pump stuff into the earth without consequences.

Great Plains Institute has THIS CARBON CAPTURE PAGE, and declares their folks are “experts.” Last time around they had Mike Gregerson flying around the country, and he probably did learn a thing or two about carbon capture, and now, he’s not one of the “experts.

Great Plains Institute got about $1 million dollars in 2017 to put together a “Carbon Capture Coalition” and promote the notion of carbon capture and storage.

How much since? Who knows, but for sure it’s a lot. Circa 2005-2009 or so, the Joyce Foundation, Doris Duke Foundation, and of course the Energy Foundation, put up a lot of money to support coal gasification and promotion of the notion of carbon capture. “Environmental” groups including local Great Plains, Izaak Walton League (I was there when Bill Grant referred to carbon capture and storage as “the way forward for coal,” and his promotion of coal gasification at the Saw Mill Inn), Fresh Energy, MCEA, and nationally, Clean Air Task Force and others…

Joyce Foundation gets $$$$ and gives $$$$

For those of us who have been through Excelsior Energy’s Mesaba Project, which as a last minute last ditch effort added “carbon capture” to its doomed project, this talk about carbon capture and storage quite an insult. Excelsior got money for promotion, and what they proposed for the project was a farce, a claim of capturing a small amount of the CO2, and taking it to the plant gate, that’s it! That’s because capturing more than a small amount costs a LOT for the technology, a prohibitive amount, in dollars, and it costs more than you want to know in plant efficiency, just not worth that loss, and keep in mind, that’s just the capture. Where would it go? Not that it was contemplated to go anywhere, but piping it to North Dakota would require yet another pipeline (good luck with that), pumping stations every 75 miles or so, and pumping and monitoring facilities at the end.

And an overview from Overland:

Here’s some of their past follies from 2007, where the toadies on parade went to Grand Rapids, the heart of the Mesaba Project area:

IEDC gets carried away

Electricity 2020 in Grand Rapids

Onward, gotta get on the road… more later…