[bix6]

> Of the $700 million, more than half will fund 13 coal plant upgrades, $185 million will match corporate funds for coal facilities in Alaska, Maryland and West Virginia, and $75 million will support the long-proposed West Gateway export terminal in Northern California.

Why not shut this all down and use the money on solar? Is there actually a defensive justification for this?

[freakynit]

Solar still doesn't work at night and we it still doesn't have an answer for grid-scale energy storage for usage at night.

[roryirvine]

Grid-scale battery storage exists, and there are several potentially viable pathways to increase scale and decrease costs in commercial development. It's not yet a complete answer, but it's not unreasonable to bet on it becoming one over the next decade or so.

Coal, on the other hand, requires CCS. But CCS projects have concentrated on nat gas and chemicals, and none of those have yet proven to be viable at scale. No coal-related CCS has ever reached the pilot stage, and no-one's seriously trying to develop them.

At this stage, the long-term future of coal looks a hell of a lot riskier than the long-term future of renewables.

[freakynit]

There are no commercially viable ways to store grid scale energy. And that is what's holding the deployment of solar "in place of" coal. As a supplementary system, it's good. As a replacement, not yet.

[roryirvine]

New coal isn't commercially viable either - the $700M subsidy discussed in this thread is proof of that.

Other countries have already been successful in entirely replacing coal with renewables. America would be well advised to follow suit rather than wasting money on trying to hold back the tide.