The coal industry is scrambling to join the rising tide of “green consciousness” promoting alternatives to our traditional fossil fuel infrastructure. Lots of politicians like Montana’s Democratic governor have joined them in this.

But when it’s all said and done is it really that much different?

Clean coal- A coal industry term that describes techonologies that are more efficient and environmentally acceptable. These techonologies “wash” the coal of minerals and impurities that cause carbon dioxide upon combustion and then reburn it so that the CO2 is recoverable. Once recoverable, it can be captured and stored.

Then all is well with the world and the climate?

Not bloody likely!

Besides the inevitable debate of where the captured carbon will be stored, the proponents of “clean coal” also are overlooking the brutal extraction methods that deliver coal to the doorsteps of the power plant (whether outdate pulverized coal plant or shiny new IGCC plant). Coal strip-mined in the Black Mesa region of Arizona or blown out of the mountains of Appalachia is drenched in blood. There are long histories of struggle and exploitation in those regions as Dineh, Hopi and Appalachian peoples fight to keep Big Coal from destroying their communities.

As anti-mountaintop removal activist and Goldman environmental prize winner Judy Bonds says “There’s no such thing as “clean coal” in West Virginia.” The same applies to Arizona and New Mexico as well.