Our "FactCheck Monday" series was planned only until Election Day, but fact-checking is an integral part of journalism, so we have decided to extend it. We encourage you to subscribe to alerts from FactCheck.org and other nonpartisan fact checkers such as PolitiFact and Glenn Kessler's Fact Checker column in The Washington Post.
First up: a hard look at the catchphrase "clean coal." President Trump has used it frequently at rallies and said it can be exported or "loaded up" on railway cars. But the phrase "refers to technologies deployed at power plants that make coal cleaner to burn, not to the fuel itself," Jessica McDonald reports for FactCheck.org. The term's modern definitions "require cuts in carbon dioxide emissions, and the only way to do that in a substantial way is through carbon capture. Just two coal power plants in the world use the technique, and it makes up less than 0.1 percent of American coal-fired capacity."
The definition of clean coal is "annoyingly nebulous," McDonald notes, and provides a thorough history of efforts to mitigate pollution from coal-fired power plants.
First up: a hard look at the catchphrase "clean coal." President Trump has used it frequently at rallies and said it can be exported or "loaded up" on railway cars. But the phrase "refers to technologies deployed at power plants that make coal cleaner to burn, not to the fuel itself," Jessica McDonald reports for FactCheck.org. The term's modern definitions "require cuts in carbon dioxide emissions, and the only way to do that in a substantial way is through carbon capture. Just two coal power plants in the world use the technique, and it makes up less than 0.1 percent of American coal-fired capacity."
The definition of clean coal is "annoyingly nebulous," McDonald notes, and provides a thorough history of efforts to mitigate pollution from coal-fired power plants.
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