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ENERGY TECH
Clean coal key to combating climate change: Rio Tinto
by Staff Writers
Sydney (AFP) Sept 09, 2014


'Without a doubt' fossil fuels to blame for climate change
Geneva, Switzerland (UPI) Sep 9, 2014 - The World Meteorological Organization said Tuesday the warming effect on the climate because of greenhouse gases increased 34 percent since 1990.

"We know without any doubt that our climate is changing and our weather is becoming more extreme due to human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels," WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud said in a statement.

WMO published its annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin Tuesday. It found the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere last year reached a new record in part because of an increase in the amount of carbon dioxide.

Carbon dioxide levels are 142 percent higher than a 1750 benchmark, a year WMO set as the start of the industrial era. For methane, emissions are 253 percent higher and nitrous oxide emissions were 121 percent more than the 1750 benchmark.

Since 1990, the WMO said radiative forcing -- the warming effect on the climate -- is up 34 percent because of the persistence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Last year, WMO said, CO2 levels in particular increased more than any other period since 1984.

"We must reverse this trend by cutting emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases across the board," Jarraud said. "We are running out of time."

Mining giant Rio Tinto said Tuesday clean coal was key to tackling climate change and that developing the technology was a challenge greater than the first moon landing.

The firm's energy chief Harry Kenyon-Slaney compared the twin challenges of meeting the world's energy needs, including growing demand from Asia, and combating climate change to the difficulties the US had to overcome for the 1969 lunar mission.

"The challenge now faced by the whole world is far more urgent and important," Kenyon-Slaney said.

"But it can be solved by the same methodical, determined process. The world has no choice."

Kenyon-Slaney's remarks came ahead of a World Meteorological Organization report released Tuesday that showed global concentrations of CO2, the main culprit in global warming, soaring to a new high in 2013.

The energy boss, who described emissions-driven climate change as "among the world's biggest and most pressing" problems, said he supported the development of all power-generating technologies including renewables.

But he said the abundance of coal meant it would remain the world's main source of "large-scale, reliable, affordable energy".

Advancing research and development in carbon capture storage, known as CCS, to make it commercially viable should therefore be a key goal for governments and businesses, Kenyon-Slaney said.

"(The technologies) can all help to combat climate change but breakthroughs in low-emissions coal generation will be fundamental. They could break the back of this problem," he said.

While CCS has been hailed as a solution to make fossil fuels cleaner, the technology has at this stage been too risky, costly and energy inefficient in its own right.

The technology involves trapping CO2 emissions from power plants and other large sources, liquefying them and storing them deep underground.

Kenyon-Slaney criticised "climate warriors" on both sides of the global warming debate, saying the world should be focusing on power-generating solutions instead.

Rio's energy section, composed mostly of coal, narrowed its losses to US$19 million in the six months to June 30, from US$52 million during the previous reporting period.

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ENERGY TECH
Britain wins carbon capture funding from EU
Brussels (AFP) July 08, 2014
A coal-burning power plant in Yorkshire is to receive 300 million euros in EU funds to develop a new way of keeping polluting carbon emissions out of the atmosphere, the EU said Tuesday. The British project is one of 19 schemes in a one billion euro ($1.4 billion) European Union effort to fight global warming and encourage innovation towards green energy. Carbon capture storage technolog ... read more


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