Coal Industry Plugs Into the Campaign

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/17/AR2008011702837.html?hpid=topnews

Coal Industry Plugs Into the Campaign

By Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 18, 2008; D01

A group backed by the coal industry and its utility allies is waging a $35 million campaign in primary and caucus states to rally public support for coal-fired electricity and to fuel opposition to legislation that Congress is crafting to slow climate change.

The group, called Americans for Balanced Energy Choices, has already spent $1.3 million on billboard, newspaper, television and radio ads in Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina.

One its television ads shows a power cord being plugged into a lump of coal, which it calls "an American resource that will help us with vital energy security" and "the fuel that powers our way of life." The ads note that half of U.S. electricity currently comes from coal-fired plants.

The group has also deployed teams on the campaign trail; about 50 people, many of them paid, walked around as human billboards and handed out leaflets outside Tuesday's Democratic debate in Nevada with questions for voters to pose to the candidates.

...

[NNadir]

1. Actually, I think the Greenpeace budget is more than $35 million bucks.

Greenpeace has been the single most effective international lobbyist for the coal interest there is.

Consistently that little collection of illiterates has been opposing the world's largest, by far, form of climate change gas free energy.

The South African coal industry has been licking its chops with healthy satisfaction since Greenpeace dunderheads began lobbying for coal in Germany.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,472786,00.html

[bananas]

4. Germany is reducing GHG emissions faster than expected

http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/emis/top2004.cap

Ranking of the world's countries by 2004 per capita
fossil-fuel CO2 emission rates. National per capita
estimates (CO2_CAP) are expressed in metric tons of carbon.

Source: Gregg Marland, Tom Boden, and Bob Andres
Oak Ridge National Laboratory

RANK NATION CO2_CAP

1 QATAR 21.63
2 KUWAIT 10.13
3 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 9.32
4 ARUBA 8.25
5 LUXEMBOURG 6.81
6 TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO 6.80
7 BRUNEI (DARUSSALAM) 6.56
8 BAHRAIN 6.53
9 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 5.61
10 CANADA 5.46

<snip>

36 GERMANY 2.67

<snip>

Germany's GHG emissions are falling faster than expected - below their target and projected emissions:
http://maps.grida.no/go/graphic/united_states_of_america_greenhouse_gas_emissions_cop7


But USA with over 100 nuke plants is killing the planet faster than expected:
http://maps.grida.no/go/graphic/united_states_of_america_greenhouse_gas_emissions_cop7

[Kolesar]

2. "Our" electric utility, First Energy, managed to contribute $800,000 themselves in 2004

That's is the bundled contributions and PAC funds from just one corporation, and not even the biggest utility in Ohio.

[bananas]

3. "Big coal may launch a 'Harry and Louise'-style disinformation campaign"

"Big coal may launch a 'Harry and Louise'-style disinformation campaign to sink global warming solutions in Congress," said Daniel J. Weiss, senior fellow and director of climate strategy for the Center for American Progress.

One of the coal industry group's radio ads hints at those themes. A woman asks: "How can we become less dependent on foreign resources? What fuels will keep power bills reasonable and be environmentally responsible?" A man responds, "We have many questions for our candidates, and coal has to be part of the discussion."


I wouldn't be surprised if they hire people pretending to be "pro-nuke liberal environmentalists" putting out all kinds of disinformation about renewables.