A lovely day at the coal fired power plant....
It's funny, the only way people can present coal power plants so they appear to live up to their reputation is to take pictures of the steam under low light conditions so it appears to be black smoke. Same thing with the lumber mills or any plant that produces steam. I know they emit pollution (we all do), but doesn't the one in your picture look so harmless compared the the pictures below?
Mine looks very harmless.....I do a lot of survey work in that 3 county area and I have never seen it like your pic's....
imaudigger, post: 411921, member: 7286 wrote: It's funny, the only way people can present coal power plants so they appear to live up to their reputation is to take pictures of the steam under low light conditions so it appears to be black smoke. Same thing with the lumber mills or any plant that produces steam. I know they emit pollution (we all do), but doesn't the one in your picture look so harmless compared the the pictures below?
I tell my kids that those are cloud factories.
imaudigger, post: 411921, member: 7286 wrote: It's funny, the only way people can present coal power plants so they appear to live up to their reputation is to take pictures of the steam under low light conditions so it appears to be black smoke. Same thing with the lumber mills or any plant that produces steam. I know they emit pollution (we all do), but doesn't the one in your picture look so harmless compared the the pictures below?
In your top photo what is shown are cooling towers. They output water vapor not "smoke". Millions (billions?) are spent annually to "clean up" the emissions from the plants, necessarily so.
Andy
Andy Bruner, post: 412131, member: 1123 wrote: In your top photo what is shown are cooling towers. They output water vapor not "smoke". Millions (billions?) are spent annually to "clean up" the emissions from the plants, necessarily so.
Andy
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is something the coal industry has been working on for decades and implementing for almost 20 years now. Proponents call it "Clean Coal". Critics say it is expensive and doesn't work. Meanwhile coal fired generation is still responsible for a third of the CO2 released into the atmosphere annually.
There are several methods the industry scrubs the carbon from the exhaust. They all work, but are expensive. The trick is what to do with it once you've captured it. About ten years ago the industry implemented a program to pump the CO2 back into the ground utilizing voids created by the removal of gas and oil. For a while it seemed to be working. What has been found to be happening is the CO2 is actually escaping from its underground storage and returning back into the atmosphere. The industry denies this claim but numbers and independent studies are convincing.
So do coal fueled power plants emit smoke too? Or just steam? I've never been around one.
Andy J, post: 412221, member: 44 wrote: So do coal fueled power plants emit smoke too? Or just steam? I've never been around one.
No more smoke, black smoke anyway, but yes a lot of "steam". While the "steam" may have been scrubbed of most of its particulates, it's still a lot more than just steam. Don't park your truck downwind either; the steam contains specks of fly-ash. If it condenses on your vehicle it's a mess to get off. And at times there can be a distinct smell of sulfur dioxide (SO2).
Everyone thinks the air quality in Alaska is some of the best around and mostly true because of the lack of heavy industry. In the spring time though we'll occasionally get a strange blue tinted haze that cuts down visibility considerably, the cause was a mystery to me until I learned that the weather patterns at that time of year allowed for some of that famous 'Beijing' smog to migrate across the Pacific our way. Yup. 'Made in China'. It's a small world after all.
Williwaw, post: 412247, member: 7066 wrote: Everyone thinks the air quality in Alaska is some of the best around and mostly true because of the lack of heavy industry. In the spring time though we'll occasionally get a strange blue tinted haze that cuts down visibility considerably, the cause was a mystery to me until I learned that the weather patterns at that time of year allowed for some of that famous 'Beijing' smog to migrate across the Pacific our way. Yup. 'Made in China'. It's a small world after all.
I read once that Fairbanks sits in a basin and can experience some poor air quality due to mainly wood smoke. Is that true?
paden cash, post: 412251, member: 20 wrote: I read once that Fairbanks sits in a basin and can experience some poor air quality due to mainly wood smoke. Is that true?
Yes. Happens here occasionally in a few local areas where a temperature inversion acts like a lid on a pot trapping wood smoke and vehicle exhaust. Smoke rises a hundred feet and hits an invisible barrier and accumulates to extremely unhealthy levels. Fairbanks area is famous for this but it can and does happen in Anchorage and low areas locally. I'm in the side of a mountain at 650' so I've only looked down on it when it happens locally, which is rare. Bit like someone locking themselves in a closet and smoking a couple packs of cigarettes.
