This week, a Georgia court in USA, halted the Construction of a new 1,200 megawatt coal-fired power plant because its supporters could not provide a plan to limit climate change-causing carbon dioxide emissions from it.

The decision marks the first lime that potential greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution has been cited as a factor in denying permission to build a new coal-fired power plant. The judgment against the setting up of the coal plant has serious ramifications as coal-fired electric generating plants currently provide for half of the electric power produced in USA and is likely to continue as the mainstay for the coming decades.

The judgment recognized global warming due to greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Human activity has been increasing the concentration of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide from combustion of coal, oil, and natural gas and a few other trace gases. Current levels are greater than 380 ppmv (parts per million by volume) and is increasing at a rate of 1.9 ppm year. Recently a report said that the carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) is the critical enabling technology to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions significantly while also allowing coal to meet the world’s pressing energy needs. The report argued that the Government should provide assistance only to coal projects with CO2 capture in order to demonstrate technical, economic and environmental performance. Congress should remove any expectation that construction of new coal plants without CO2 capture and granted emission allowances in the event of future regulation. This is a perverse incentive to build coal plants without CO2 capture today.

Large fossil fuel companies should be put on trial for crimes against humanity and nature. The present scenario and the global warming science has been corrupted in the same way that tobacco companies once attempted to blur the links between smoking and cancer, and for Government investments in alternative energy to help end the organizations involved with the work dependence. The unkindest cut to future coal-fired power generation came recently when the Bush administration decided to withdraw funding to FutureGen, the US government’s effort to develop a clean coal power plant.

Between 2000 and 2006, US utilities submitted over 150 coal plant proposals. By 2007, they constructed 10 of them; 25 additional plants were under construction. But during 2007, 59 proposed plants were cancelled, abandoned, or put on hold. Concerns about global warming played a major role in 15 of these cases. Coal plants are being eliminated from long-range plans. Of the 59 plants which took the hits, 44 were abandoned by the utilities themselves because of increase in construction costs, insufficient financing or failure to receive expected government grants, lowering of estimates of power demand and concerns about future carbon regulations.

Where do we go from here? Nuclear power may not offer a full solution. Nuclear power remains a potentially attractive option for enhancing the security of electricity supply and mitigating carbon-dioxide emissions but at the end of the day all of us have to take the responsibility and do our bit to save the environment.