'Michigan Coal-Powered Plants\r'

'1769, or the start of the Industrial revolution was when throng Watt patented his steam engine.  All the force outed machines like the steamboat, steamship, and steam locomotives, were all powered by burn.  sear is a solid fossil raise that when mined, sack be used for energy.  Today, more(prenominal)(prenominal) hence 90% of scorch is used for electrical energy and that which isn’t used for that is used as an industrial power source.  blacken fired railroads stopped in the 1950’s and industrial use has declined, but electric utilities urinate increased their use of ember tenfold in the past 50 forms.  By the early twentieth century, radiator heat was powered by coal and quondam(a) households still apply their coal chutes.Wyoming, Colorado and western United States Virginia atomic number 18 some of our main coal producers and our show far exceeds that of oil and natural gas.  Today, 52% of electricity gene placed in the United Stat es is coal powered compargond to all 14.8% for thermonuclear power.  In 2004, 1.16 billion gobs of coal was burned, most for electricity.  At the current usage rate of coal, the world has 1500 years left to use this resource.There atomic number 18 actually legion(predicate) cons of using coal scour though Americans ar more leery of nuclear power.  It was found that hatful who kick the bucket near coal-fired builds be exposed to higher radiation past plenty living by the nuclear plants.  (McBride, J.P.)  Because of people’s fears close to nuclear energy, most plants allow be replaced with coal-fired plants unless solar energy is harnessed in a better way.  First and foremost, coal produces carbon dioxide, which is venture to cause global warming.  Human health is predisposed because coal is a source of sulfur oxides and due north oxides, two sources that may cause acid rain.  combust in any case contains uranium and thorium, two hot materials.  In 1982, each U.S. plant released 5.2 tons of uranium and 12.8 tons of thorium.Total was 801 tons of uranium and 1971 tons of thorium.  It is predicted in the year 2040, that 145,230 tons of uranium and 357,491 tons of thorium will be released in the U.S. alone.  These boastfully quantities of these two materials argon not organism treated as radioactive waste.  Coal-powered plants aren’t regulated and are basically permitted to loose low-levels of radiation.  Long-term accumulation of these radioactive materials could pose monstrous health hazards… already the effects are being seen, showing up as more asthma attack in children.  Michigan has the highest prevalence of asthma in children.Exposure within 30 miles of a coal-powered plant showed 1,929,662 children with 18% of them having asthma.  Large amounts of contamination that coal-fired plants reinforced before 1977 are exempt from the Clean Air Act.  Illinois alone has 2 2 plants that are exempt and in 1997 these plants emitted 240,000 tons of northward Oxide, or as much as the one-year pollution from 12 million cars!Also in 1997, Illinois plants emitted 722,000 tons of Sulfur Dioxide which fine particulate pollution of this has been attributed to 5,570 premature deaths a year in Illinois and 3,767 in the city of Chicago alone, according to a 1996 require by the Environmental Working Group.  (http://www.consciouschoice.com/1995-98/cc115/note115.html.)With so many health problems, potential and active, why are coal plants still being proposed?   The broad Lakes basin is home to more than thirty million people.  The neat Lakes are the largest system of issue fresh urine on the Earth, spanning about 800 miles and containing about 20% of the worlds surface freshwater resource. The water in the Great Lakes accounts for more than 90% of the surface freshwater in the U.SBut this beautiful land as well as has the modified focus of our e stablishment activity and that is they want the Great Lakes region to be the future sites of many more coal-powered plants.  As many as 94 plants are already in various stages of planning.  Ten plants in Illinois, five in Wisconsin, and already Northern Lights Coal Plant in Michigan is causing quite a stir.  At first this plant was addicted a hesitant welcome since it was claiming to be the cleanest coal-powered plant in the U.S. and would create jobs, but looking deeper into it, it was observe that thither were political and environmental regulatory trends and that the crotch h phone line administration wanted a nationwide wad in proposals for new coal-fired power stations, with a special focus on the Great Lakes region.President Bush wants to point federal environmental safeguards and encourage combustion more fossil fuels.  He has agreed that older coal fired plants in Michigan and other states rent to modernize their plants, but will still vacate improvin g air pollution controls.With all this, there are some good things about burning coal.  Natural gas, which is much more cleaner then coal, has gone up in price.  The price has double since 1990 and costs four times more to bewilder then coal so burning coal is more economically feasible for the country.   Also, since 1960, particulate precipitators have been used by U.S. coal-fired plants, which reduce 99.5% of the fly ash.  Utilities can also collect ash, cinders, and slag and deposit them on coal-plant sites.  Coal ash is rich in minerals including large quantities of aluminum and iron, which haven’t been fully looked into.  If the government could really regulate coal-fired plants, these would be great advantages of having them.In conclusion, coal-fired plants are hazardous to human health, animals, and nature especially for those of us living in the Great Lakes region.  Instead of the government looking at just the economic advantages of coal, they should also be focusing on what the implications are of producing closely 100 plants in a few states.  Canada has already charged that 50% of the pollutants that cause ozone come from the middle west states so one can only depend if you actually live in one of these states, what people must be breathing in.  The Bush establishment contracts to clarify and fix the Clean-Air Act so that not only do older plants need to modernize, but also they need to be regulated.  The Great Lakes are a beautiful region to live and vacation and need to be protected against the air toxins that will be released if all these coal-fired plants are built and un-monitored.Bibliography McBride, J.P., R.E. Moore, J.P. Witherspoon, R.E. Blanco.  â€Å"Radiological Impact ofAirborne Effluents of Coal and atomic Plants.”  science Magazine.  Dec 8, 1978.Schneider, Keith.  â€Å"The Bush Administration Pushes Dirty Coal Plants.”  E / TheEnvironmental Magazine.   August 20, 2004.http://www.climateark.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=34416.Gabbard, Alex.  â€Å"Coal Combustion:  Nuclear Resource or Danger.”  NoDate.  http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html.No Author.  â€Å" storey of Energy.”  DKospedia, The Free Political Encyclopedia.December 21, 2004.No Author.  â€Å"Self-Reported Asthma Prevalence and tick off Among Adults — UnitedStates, 2001.”  MMWR Weekly.  V.52 May 2, 2003 pg. 381-384.http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5217a2.htm.Lilliston, Ben.  â€Å"Poison Power.”  Conscious Choice.  family 1998.http://www.consciouschoice.com/1995-98/cc115/note115.html.\r\n'