Tune In To WUNC Noon Today

but I had to get back to work.

They dedicated the first 15 minutes or so to Bill Watson, an energy economist who talked about the way our current infrastructure is geared towards coal, and how we have some 150 years worth of coal deposits to draw from. He also discussed how the current economic forecasts do not take into consideration the possibility (probability?) of carbon taxes being levied in the near future, and how that would totally change the economic viability of coal usage.

The debate between Jim Warren (NCWARN) and Tom Williams (Duke Energy) centered around the massive increase in C02 emissions from the new Cliffside plant. The Duke rep kept explaining their plans to shut down several other (older) plants in the years to come to bring their emissions back to what they are now. Which, in the current Global Warming debate centered around massive reductions, is a damned weak argument in my book.

Jim Warren spoke about Duke Energy's massive and misleading PR campaign of newspaper ads claiming Cliffside would reduce "regulated" emissions by 80%. The problem is, most people aren't aware that carbon emissions are not regulated yet, so they will assume (from this ad) that C02 is being reduced as well, when, in fact, it's increasing substantially.

He also spoke about the way many other states (and countries) are pursuing the right courses of action, while North Carolina is allowing 2.4 billion dollars to be spent on a pollution machine when that money is desperately needed for efficiency and alternative power research/generation.

Overall, I'm not real happy with the way the show was done. Starting out with the economist placed coal usage in too much of a favorable light. And of course, this guy didn't mention anything about the costs associated with using dirty energy, from health issues to future rising sea-level impacts. Without looking at the whole picture, cost assessments are faulty and misleading.