Washington, abril 29, 2010
Observing that India and China are not going to turn their back on coal because of their increasing energy needs, a top Obama Administration official has told American lawmakers that the United States needs to develop clean coal technologies.
“I agree with you absolutely that China and India are not going to turn their back on coal, and so we have to develop the technologies that can use coal cleanly,” the US Energy Secretary, Steven Chu, said yesterday in response to a question from Senator George Voinovich.
“The United States, quite frankly, I don’t believe will turn its back on coal as well. So we need to develop these clean coal technologies,” Chu said as he appeared before the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee of Senate Appropriations Committee on National Assessment of Energy Policies.
“We know darned well that even though the Sierra Club and others are shutting down new coal-fired IGCC plants in this country, China’s building them, India’s building them.
In fact, India said they’re going to build the biggest coal-fired plant ever in the history of the world,” said Voinovich.
Chu said there are a number of co-ordinations at the international level going on right now.
“The Australians have set up a worldwide initiative that we’re members of. We’re in -- specifically with China there’s -- the president announced, I think it was about six months ago, a research cooperative where it’s USD 150 million in three areas: energy efficient buildings, energy efficient vehicle electrification, and clean coal technology,” he said.
“So China and the US are putting USD 25 million apiece into co-developing some clean coal technology we can both use,” he added.
Chairman of the Committee, Senator Byron Dorgan said the world’s population is growing and so is the appetite for energy.
“We use almost a quarter of the world’s oil every single day. But we also know that with a growing population in the world, there are going to be hundreds of millions of people in China and India that want to find a gas station probably once a week or once every couple of weeks in the future,” he said.
Chu said leaders in China recognise that if the world continues on its current path, climate change will be devastating to China and the rest of the world.
“They also see the economic opportunity that clean energy represents. One company in China, State Grid, is investing USD 88 billion by 2020 in ultra-high-voltage transmission lines.
These lines will allow China to transmit power from the huge wind and solar farms far from its cities,” he said.
“China’s also building now under construction 20 nuclear power plants, and it is playing to win in this clean energy race.
For the sake of our economy, our security, and our environment, America must develop decisive policies that will allow us not only to compete in the clean energy race, but to become a leader in providing clean energy technology to the world.
And what will be required is a non-partisan leadership, collaboration between Congress and the administration,” Chu said.
Source: http://beta.thehindu.com/business/Industry/article415224.ece
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