Coen Clean Coal Conference Call TRANSCRIPT
On February 26, 2009, as part of the announcement for the new Coen Brothers corrective to coal industry practice, The Reality Coalition convened a conference call for press to hear from Reality Coalition Spokesman Brian Hardwick and Sierra Club National Coal Campaign Director Bruce Nilles.
TRANSCRIPT, Coen Brothers Clean Coal Ad “Air Freshener” 02.26.09
Introductory Statements:
BRIAN HARDWICK: The background how they got involved was that our agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky out of Boulder Colorado sent the script to them and they agreed, they liked the script they thought is was compelling, was in their style an so they were interested in directing it. So this is the first in a series that we intend to rollout over the coming month or so in what we’re calling our clean coal clean series.
The strategy behind the ad is one we started to employ which the Reality Campaign put out which is essentially starting to illuminate the truth about so-called clean coal. The coal industry has spent 40 million dollars plus on the advertising behind this bogus concept of clean coal. So the purpose of our campaign is to make clear to the American people that today Clean Coal does not exist. We think it’s particularly important as we continue to debate our energy future and face the continuing threat of the climate crisis. So we know that not only is the coal industry continuing to invest in this bogus marketing effort, but the also have committed themselves to delaying any real progress on climate legislation and any progress on putting a cap on carbon. They were just yesterday highlighted as the number 1 lobbyist in Washington fighting climate legislation. The obviously continue to spend money in that direction as well. And it at the end of the day this is simple math for the coal industry. They have determined that it is cheaper for them to spend money on a marketing campaign and lobbyists than actually put their money where their mouth is and spend the money to find out if technology exists that can capture carbon and clean up their act with regard to the other environmental impacts that the extraction of coal and the burning of coal produces. So for them it’s a simple business decision but for us it’s important that we let the American people know that at this time. At this crucial time when we’re facing a climate crisis we cannot hang our hat on an illusion and that illusion is this clean coal myth that the industry has been selling. So with that I’ll turn it over to Bruce.
BRUCE NILLES: Thank you Brian. Coal plays a critical role is solving the climate crisis. Coal today is the largest contributor to climate emissions in the United States and the recent science from Dr. Jim Hansen and other NASA scientists is that if we’re gonna solve the cc, we simply need to be slowing and ending colas contribution to gw and he laid out a roadmap that we simply can’t build new coal plants today that emit carbon dioxide, i.e. we can’t be building new coal plants because there is no such thing as coal plants that capture the carbon. And that secondly that we need to be retiring the existing fleet of approximately 500 coal plants over the next 20 years and if we do that we have a chance of preventing runaway climate change. Now against that backdrop of what the science says, the coal industry for the last six years has been, ah, what began as a fairly stealth campaign, tried to take the country in a whole new direction by building a fleet of as many as a fleet of 150 new coal burning power plants across the united states. Only a single one of those was trying to do some research on whether if in the decades ahead could be something that could actually control the carbon. That one project had been abandoned. So all the projects the coal industry was proposing to try to get built and get locked in before we get any comprehensive climate legislation were all conventional coal plants that would add an enormous amount of new carbon emissions into the atmosphere and essentially eclipse any market for clean energy. There simply wouldn’t be any investors interested in inventing clean energy if we build all these – if we’re awash in coal-generated electricity. Thankfully in response to that effort, to try to lock in old outdated coal plant technology has been a remarkable groundswell of public opposition to where the coal industry has been trying to take the country. In the last six years, 92 of those proposed coal plants have been either defeated or abandoned. There’s been a remarkable and robust discussion and public outcry about plans to build an enormous new plant in Florida, Michigan and Kansas, and Oklahoma. And many of those states in response to what the coal industry is trying to do have put new coal plants entirely off limits. So for example Governor Crist in Florida, they’ve essentially shut down plans to build 5 news coal plants there. More recently in Michigan, 2 weeks ago Governor Granholm said she was putting all the (44 53 specs?) for those coal plants in her state on hold because it was inconsistent with her visions of a clean energy economy and trying to have that state so it’s part to solve global warming. And so we’ve seen a remarkable up swell of public opposition and public leaders, our elected leaders are standing up and saying we can do better than building new coal plants. We see that same story in Kansas… unlikely places like in addition to Kansas, Oklahoma just abandoned another coal plant 2 weeks ago in response to citizens’ concerns But there’s still a lot to do and the coal industry with its ad campaign is really trying to mislead the public that there is such as thing as clean coal. So this ad campaign is critical to beat back that misinformation campaign and the other really good piece of news on the campaign front is with a new pres and a new commitment to science and the rule of law, Lisa Jackson has announced that she is moving forward to regulate carbon dioxide. The first indication of that, the first action she took was moving forward to essentially revisit one of the midnight regulations the bush admin put in place to try to limit and environmental appeals board decision that which said EPA can’t move forward to regulate carbon from coal plants. Steve Johnson on the way out the door said No they can’t, — Lisa Jackson said hey wait a minute that’s not consistent with where want to go, we are revisiting that and we should be issuing rules to take the country in a different direction shortly. So a lot of progress in addition to carbon, one of the things the coal industry has been very successful in the years past is enormous loopholes allow them to do things that no other industry is allowed to do. So they have loopholes for coal ash and we saw that dec 23 with the enormous pba spill. And its simply because the coal industry has managed to exempt itself from the kind of rules that should apply to that kind of hazardous waste. The destruction of Appalachia and mountain top removal again a loophole in the clean water act allowing industry to dump mining waste in streams that you an I if we were to put our yard waste in streams would be prosecuted for. So the coal industry days of loopholes for the coal industry are beginning to close we think but it’s critical that their misinformation campaign which we have to conclude if you look at what they’re really trying to do it’s not about trying to answer the scientific question of can they be a part of the solution in a carbon constrained world, it’s all about delay and trying to delay. And delay any action on climate they simply have been unwilling to put their money into scientific research trying to answer that question but its’ then out into lobbying and the misinformation campaign so we’re delighted to be part of this reality ad campaign to rebut those efforts and to get us moving forward consistent with science and the rule of law.
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