A Brief Note On Coal And Its Effects On The Environment

Coal is the dirtiest of all fossil fuels. When burned, it produces emissions that contribute to global warming, create acid rain and pollute water. With all of the talk surrounding nuclear energy, hydropower and biofuels, you might be forgiven for thinking that grimy coal is finally on its way out. On the other hand, coal is no sooty remnant of the Industrial Revolution - it generates half of the electricity in the United States and will likely continue to do so as long as it's cheap and plentiful . Clean coal technology seeks to reduce harsh environmental effects by using multiple technologies to clean. Coal is a fossil fuel composed primarily of carbons and hydrocarbons. Its ingredients help make plastics, tar and fertilizers. A coal derivative, a solidified carbon called coke, melts iron ore and reduces it to create steel. But most coal - 92 percent of the U.S. supply - goes into power production .Electric companies and businesses with power plants burn coal to make the steam that turns turbines and generates electricity. When coal burns, it releases carbon dioxide and other emissions in flue gas, the billowing clouds you see pouring out of smoke stacks. Some clean coal technologies purify the coal before it burns. One type of coal preparation, coal washing, removes unwanted minerals by mixing crushed coal with a liquid and allowing the impurities to separate and settle. Other systems control the coal burn to minimize emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and

The biggest concern associated with coal energy is the affect it has on the environment. It is a dirty fuel that pollutes the air, water and land. Burning coal releases harmful waste such as carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide,

Coal has been around for 250 million years, but only has been used since the 1800’s first by trains and now for energy all around the world and many other things that people couldn't think of! Coal is a combustible sedimentary organic rock which is composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. It is formed from vegetation which has been consolidated between two other rock strata and altered by the combined effects of pressure and heat over millions of years to form coal seams. There are over 174,000 jobs in the U.S associated with coal and 83,000 of them are mining jobs, Coal miners have found many ways to extract coal from the ground which includes, surface mining, longwall mining, room and pillar mining, and underground mining. “Surface

Even people who do not develop illnesses from coal pollutants will find their health and wellbeing impacted due to coal's contribution to global warming. The discharge of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere associated with burning coal is a major contributor to global warming and its adverse effects on health and wellbeing worldwide, such as heat stroke, malaria, declining food production, scarce water supplies, social conflict and

There are two types of mining – surface mining and underground mining. If coal is found near the surface then surface mining is used. Surface mining involves removing the top layer of soil and rock over a

In how many ways can coal impact the environment? Coal is a type of rock that consists of plant matter, and it is one of the two fossil fuels. It is transferred into energy by the powder being burned, then the heat turns the water into steam and the high pressure heat turns a turbine, which is connected to a generator. Coal energy impacts the environment by, providing jobs, a stable energy source, and the pollution it gives off.

Without coal, humanity and society would be a very different place. The industrial revolution would have never happened. Therefore, the transition from man made objects to machine systems, the factories that span the earth, and the overall change that came over the world both physically but also for humankind would be vastly different. Instead, we would be still using water wheels to power most things. Electricity, heat, steam, steel, chemicals, and many more important products from coal usage wouldn 't exist if coal was non-existent. We wouldn 't have spawned the age of innovation, which brought about electricity and oil, which vastly improved society and have brought us to the technology-filled world we have today. However, coal has also negatively impacted the earth in an ecological way. Although the usage of coal has negative effects on the environment, the benefits gained from its use far outweighs the disadvantages, which makes coal have a large, and overall positive impact on society. This will be proven by analyzing the uses of coal in our present society, the environmental impact coal has had on the earth and how the dependence on coal makes a large network of supply and demand, which allows other nations to profit off each other.

While technology has led the world into such an advanced setting with intelligent machinery and automated devices, coal has remained a loyal contributor of the energy needed by these various types of equipment to function properly. Almost half of the electricity in the United States is produced in coal plants where coal is burnt to produce this energy [1]. Both beneficial and detrimental factors come with this alternative source of energy, known by the world for centuries.

Unfortunately, there are many disadvantages associated with the combustion of coal energy. For example coal releases a tremendous amount of carbon emissions that negatively contribute to climate change and global warming. Coal burning is considered not environmentally friendly due to the large production of harmful by-products such as nitrogen, carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide. This pollution can lead to other major problems for example acidic rain, as well as hazardous health risks to our eco-systems. Globally, scientists agree that the release of greenhouse gases are contributing to the earths rise in temperature, which leads to rising sea levels, disappearing glaciers and change in annual weather patterns. The main problem associated with

Imagine your daily life and how much technology is integrated into it, now, even if you don’t think that you use a lot of technology, remember that most of what we use today in our daily lives, need some sort of electricity to make it, or run it. We live in a world that is almost dependent upon electricity, modern life is unimaginable without electricity. Coal produces almost half of the electricity we use. There is much controversy about coal and why we rely on it so heavily. The question that emerges from this controversy is “should we be mining and processing as much coal as we do on a daily basis, and should we downscale, or find alternatives?”

Coal is the most abundant fossil fuel available to humans, there is no argument. There is an estimated 3.9 trillion short tons of coal in the USA alone, and that would be only 21% of the entire world's coal (EIA, 2017). That is a massive amount of coal, but no matter how much coal there is, the human race is using it at a rate much faster than the speed at which it can be produced in nature, therefore the resource is bound to be depleted unless current practices are changed. With the current rate at which coal is used in the world, it will only be around for another 50-56 years (Chiras, 2016). Since it will only be around for roughly 50 years, if usage rates continue as they are, it can not be a major energy source for the next 100 years. Not only will coal just simply not last for the next hundred years when used as is, it is also not an environmentally friendly way to produce energy. Coal is the leading air pollutant in the united states with the typical uncontrolled coal plant emitting 3.5 million tons of CO2, 14,100 tons of SO2 per year, 10,300 tons of NOx per year (UCSUSA, 2015). These major air pollutants can result in acid rain, destruction of the ozone layer, and a wide variety of human health problems. Coal also emits many more heavy metals and solid particulates into the air every year. These substances pollute the Earth’s atmosphere and result in many problems. Coal produces a great amount of energy, but it also produces a great amount of pollutants that get released into the atmosphere and the environment, therefore it can not be a major source of energy for the next 100 years or more problems will occur. Aside of air pollution from using coal, the extraction and production of coal has adverse effects on the environment too. Surface mining produces several environmental hazards and releases a large quantity of pollutants through erosion and runoff. When land is stripped away to reveal a coal seam, not only does it destroy habitats and quality land, it increases erosion and causes a substantial amount of the materials and sediment to be carried into nearby streams. In Kentucky for example, where contour strip mines were located, the amount of erosion grew about 372 times the original, .18 tons per

Coal burning for electrical power is a big industry, but it creates a lot of big problems. Coal is full of carbon dioxide and burning it releases the CO2 into the atmosphere (Overview of Greenhouse Gases). The coal mining process creates pollution as well. Rubble and debris can end up in streams and pollute the water (McQuaid)(Pond et al). However, this pollution can be lessened. Coal mining and burning is an industry that creates large amounts of air and water pollution, but with proper regulations such as cap and trade programs and Command and Control government regulations on mining, the damage created by the industry can be reduced.

Coal has been one of the main and most used resources of energy, although it is a non-renewable resource and is a fossil fuel. Most countries depend on the combustion of coal when it comes to generating electricity. Burning coal has its advantages, like efficiently releasing energy in the form of heat, but it also has its disadvantages. The combustion of coal contributes to many environmental issues like climate change and acid rain, which lead to many health problems. One of the main polluting products of coal combustion is

Coal has had a tremendous effect on the world. It produces the most electricity when compared to other fuels. The US generates more than half of their electricity from coal. This black or brownish‐black fossil fuel, formed by the energy in plants hundreds of millions of years ago, is made up of mostly carbon, hydrogen, and small traces of other elements like sulfur. Coal has four main types of categories. Mining is the method used to extract coal from underneath the ground. After coal is mined, it needs to be processed in order to increase its heating value. These sedimentary rocks are excellent in producing energy, but they also pollute the environment and increase global warming. With all of

The main problem is extracting the coal from its sources, or mines can pose as a huge risk to lives of those employed in such tasks. A perfect example of this is when in April 2010 in Montcoal, West Virginia at the Upper Big Branch Mine where high methane levels were detected. The methane caused an explosion that killed twenty-nine out of thirty-one of the miners. There is also carbon dioxide gases emitted into the atmosphere once coal is burned for fuel, and that has a negative impact on our environment. This can eventually lead to global climate change, among other things. According to Coal and Global Warming which was