Clean Coal

The Minnesota-bred Coen Brothers made a mock clean-coal ad for the Reality Coalition (via raw story):

Like Al Franken, Joel and Ethan Coen grew up in the Minneapolis suburb of St. Louis Park. People say, wow, something in the water? Actually, yeah: coal pollution.

Sen. Norm Coleman’s campaign, highly paid Republican bloggers and their lapdogs in the mainstream media are trumpeting the news that former DFL state Sen. Doug Johnson of Cook has endorsed the Republican Coleman for U.S. Senate. What they aren’t telling you is that Johnson is a registered lobbyist for Excelsior Energy, which is trying to build a controversial $2.3 billion “clean coal” energy plant on the Iron Range that has earned Coleman’s enthusiastic support for tens of millions of dollars in federal grants and loan guarantees.

First $100 a barrel oil. Soon $100 per metric ton coal?

Citigroup is forecasting the price of thermal coal will nearly double in 2008-09 from its current price of $55 per ton — and that doesn’t reflect the cost of anticipated carbon regulation. The price spike has more to do with weather than climate: A harsh, [...]