Flying the Coal-Fired Skies

Actually, the coal-to-liquid industry needs to be big enough to provide liquid fuels (gasoline or diesel) for America's 200 million vehicles which require such fuels.

Of late the global warming advocates are growing leary of actually using the term "global warming" and instead warn us constantly of "climate change" which they continue to insist is completely driven by humans burning fossil fuels.

The global warming of the late 20th century has stopped. So far the 21st century has been all about global cooling. The much-touted summer meltback of the Arctic Ice, particularly around Alaska, looks to be a product of increasing amounts of soot and dust from China and other growing Asian economies that fall on snow and ice and melt them readily when sunlight is available by increasing the absorption of solar energy.

The Democrat Party seems hell-bent on ignoring reality and codifying a War on Coal into national law to last forever. Is this really a way to pull the "Saudi Arabia of Coal" out of a major depression, or merely another way to selectively award your friends in some sectors with taxpayer cash while punishing those industries who didn't contribute enough to the campaigns of certain politicians?

Yes, by all means let's put more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and support using the most environmentally destructive fossil fuel of them all. The whole "global warming is not man-made" argument has been well-debunked by people with better scientific credentials than my own (and well-documented in the pages of PopSci, I might add), so I'll just skip arguing with dittoheads over that point and go straight to other arguments against using coal for synth fuels.

First of all, it is a great deal more energy intensive than refining even other fossil fuels, even if they aren't great in themselves. That's why the Axis powers in WWII didn't resort to using synth fuels until it was obvious they wouldn't have enough petroleum to fuel their war machines otherwise. It's just more expensive than the alternatives, and even some biofuels might be cheaper to refine into jet fuel.

Second, there's the cost in mining coal, measured both in local environmental degradation and in the hazard to human life. Below-ground mines present one of the most dangerous work environments around, with well-publicized cave-ins and deaths almost every year in he U.S., and even more in China. Mountain top removal and strip mining may be safer,but they destroy natural habitats and often pollute streams and rivers.

Also, as the TVA incident two weeks ago demonstrated, burning coal leaves nasty problems like toxic coal ash, loaded with arsenic, mercury, and other heavy metals that can get into the local water supply. Air pollution is another problem, as even the poster above noted that soot from China (primarily a result of their massive reliance on coal-fired power plants) can cause wide spread problems for other countries. Acid rain, respiratory problems for people downwind, and smoggy skies even in the Appalachian mountain national parks help illustrate just how big a problem burning coal presents.

Unfortunately, many people see this as a political issue, when it isn't. The coal industry has contributed generously to both Democrats and Republicans, especially in West Virginia, Tennessee, and other coal producing states. They care less about political idealogy, and more about ensuring they make a profit, regardless of the consequences to our environment or our future. There are plenty of reasons to move beyond coal as a major fuel source, even if we don't agree on all of the so-called political points.

Thank you Mike Cook. I am glad to see there are still some people out there with some sense left in them. Mike_R: you need to stop caring more about the environment and other countries and more about humans and the greatest country in the world. If we destroy a few habitats and kill a some animals to better our economy and dependency on foreign oil then i say by all means DO IT! There won't be anyone to enjoy the beauty of the forests and nature if nobody has any money to travel anywhere because we sent all of our money and jobs overseas. And as for the danger of it, well every job is dangerous. You can't keep from doing something just because it's dangerous. If you did then you would just be a person to sit in a dark corner in a fetal position all your life (and even that can be dangerous). As for it not being a political issue Mike_R i have to agree with you because our country needs to work together and not be like "Oh well i cant believe that way because its liberal" or "Thats not right cause its conservative." We would be able to better our country so much more if we looked beyond parties and did what is right and what is just.

PS- this is a little weird cause all three of us are named Mike lol

In world war 2, the Germans didn't have any spheres of influence in the middle east, and what with being in a war, they had very little access to traditional crude oil. So to make up for it, they made oil out of coal. They ran everything from this synthoil, including their aircraft.

When a German aircraft came upon a British/American aircraft, I believe the Germans had the technical advantage, having better engines; however, the Allies had access to the good oil, which burned a lot better in aircraft engines than synthoil; this was one of the reasons the Allied aircraft were able to defeat the Luftwaffe; the allied aircraft could pull off maneuvers that the Germans could not because their fuel would not burn properly (or something to that effect) under the same circumstances as the Allied aircraft.

That was then, with old school technology; planes that used carburetors and props. I really don't think modern aircraft with jet turbines will do all that well with synthoil.

Whatever happened to the common sense? How about the old saying "One man's trash is another man's treasure"?
While I think it's great that the Air Force is pushing for alternatives to foreign oil, there really needs to be a push on multiple fronts. Coal is a very myopic and narrow temporary fix. Distributed, multiple fuel sources is the best long term policy. This prevents any single choke hold on the AF's fuel. No country or company could develop a debilitating monopoly. But depending on coal makes the AF severely dependent upon the coal companies.
We dump massive amounts of rubber, plastic, and used cooking oil into landfills every day. We already have ways to recycle these, and it's about time to push these forward.
The rubber and plastic could be broken down into oil using a modified microwave system. I believe it was in Popular Science that I read about this very technique.
Then there's the now well known biodiesel process that takes used cooking oil and transforms it into useful fuel. And now there's at least one company that has figured out how to convert this into kerosene that is chemically identical. In other words, jet fuel.

Instead of global warming, how about calling it 'global sea rise'! The polar ice caps are melting!

The Air Force doesn't have to use coal. That can make aviation fuel from urban biomass and rural biomass. And the Air Force has actually invested in companies that are currently using biowaste to produce jet fuel.

Aviation fuel can also be produced from carbon dioxide and hydrogen via the extraction of CO2 from air and hydrogen from water through electrolysis.

Marcel F. Williams

"Mike_R: you need to stop caring more about the environment and other countries and more about humans and the greatest country in the world." -rogueagent123

You sir are a crazy man. If anything, you should cherish what clean air, and water you have left with your kind of thinking. The green front and global warming by some degrees are kind of absurd, but they DO push for better alternatives. I think living in a cleaner world is worth stopping the pollutants that this nation (and other nations) put into the air. Quality of life and nature will go up. That being said, coal is a stupid idea. However I feel that they should be looking beyond the coal and not relying on it.

-Marcel F. Williams : thanks you for that insight.

As an ex aircraft mechanic I would fill up my A-10 with hundreds of gallons of jet fuel for just a 2 hour training mission. Let me rephrase that... For a training mission that jet would use more fuel in 2 hours than I would use in a year.

With that in mind the US is terrified of putting it proverbial eggs into one basket. We depend so much on foreign oil to not only to fuel the citizens of the US but also the military. What would happen if we went to war (with any country) and lost our middle east oil connections. Is that the time to start exploring alternative fuel sources?

I don't like the coal idea either, it's dirty and dangerous and it's hurting our environment. I like Tom M's comments on recycling what we have. Keep in mind the Air Force is here to protect the country and it's people and it needs massive amounts of fuel to do that.

The US produces enough urban garbage and sewage to supply about 25% of our total aviation transportation needs. If you include rural biowaste from farms and forest then you could more than double that amount. So there's more than enough biowaste to supply all US military aircraft with fuel.

Coal is just fossilized biowaste. So fundamentally both coal and biowaste are pretty much the same stuff except that one is renewable and the other is not.

Marcel F. Williams

http://www.newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/

What about brown's gas? currently this is being used to increase the gas mileage of vehicles and if it can work there why not here? big bonus is water is not explosive and could be used to put out fires and also for drinking and flushing the toilet ;)

What about brown's gas? currently this is being used to increase the gas mileage of vehicles and if it can work there why not here? big bonus is water is not explosive and could be used to put out fires and also for drinking and flushing the toilet ;)

"each liter of water expands into 1866 liter of combustible gas" http://www.brownsgas.com/hhogas.html

Global Warming is a scam. The science behind it is junk. An eight thousanths of a percent change (00.008%) in the atmosphere composition will not cause catastophic weather changes. It is a theory appropriated by left wing liberals and socialists to use to limit technological growth and control peoples lives. After 8 years of the Earth not warming - that's right the average temperature of the Earth did not increase under George Bush - the buzz words have become "Climate Change". The Earth's climate has constantly changed and we are so far powerless to affect it, but we adapt.

At a time when the USA needs jobs and needs to reduce our trade deficit, Henry Waxman makes it illegal to produce our own jet fuel. Think of the thousands of jobs, the billions of dollars reduced in deficit spending, and the tax revenues the government would enjoy if we did make coal liquification plants. And that is not even considering the strategic aspects.

I don't expect things to get better in the near term. Obama is appointing a member of Socialist International to be our next energy czar - Carol Browning. Remember when Obama was questioned about tax cuts. He was told that reducing taxes in the past not only spurred economic growth, but it resulted in increased revenues to the government. His response was that it was more important to raise taxes to "be fair", even if it meant the country's economy would suffer.

It the same PopSci issues, there is an article about some nut who is going to walk across the Arctic Ice cap to prove that its melting away. This time last year it was predicted that the polar ice cap would melt entirely during the summer of 2008 (now they put it off for 5 to 100 years). While this was widely circulated, hardly anyone mentioned that more than 400,000 square miles of ice remained through the end of the summer, more than in 2007.

The Artic ice cap is not particularly thick. Currents flow under it and push it, the ice is constantly being upheaved, broken, and drifting away to warmer seas where it melts. Remember the Nautilas surfaced at the north pole in 1964, easily breaking through the ice. Numerous atomic subs have done the same since. So when this guy comes back and states that the ice cap is too thin - remember it has always been relatively thin and occasionally in the past has vanished entirely.

Er, that should be Carol Browner.

Dan Zer: well stated.

Et al: My contribution is in the form of a question; If GW has/is causing sea levels to rise, when will I notice the rise? I've lived on the Atlantic coast for almost 60 years - rocks that I played on as a kid are still above water, I walked on them yesterday, just to be sure!

Another point. If recoverable shale oil, off-shore oil, and the oil reserves in Alaska are counted, the USA has more oil reserves than any other country in the world, not the mere 3% frequently quoted in the recent election. At our current use of oil, what we have available that we are pretty sure we have could last over 400 years.

While it may be a good idea to reduce our use of oil for energy for numerous reasons, we don't have the technology now and it may be 25 to 35 years before it is fully realized. Meanwhile we need to stop bleeding our country white sending all our money to foreign despots (Canada not included, who is our #1 supplier of oil).

As long as we are using oil we should exploit our own reserves. This would create domestic jobs, greatly increase tax revenues to the government and not have much of any impact on pollution levels. It would just change where the oil is coming from and where the money is going.

There is a company called Carbon Sciences (CABN) that was featured in Popular Mechanics a while back. They have developed a way to convert CO2 into calcium carbonate, and have recently announced that they are developing a way to convert CO2 into fuels. Their website says that their process is more efficient than the Fischer-Tropsch process. They are scheduled to unveil a prototype by the first half of 2009 that demonstrates the CO2 to fuel method (CO2 to calcium carbonate already has been demonstrated). If their plan works it could possibly be used with this method to cut CO2 emissions, increase efficiency, and supplement the amount of fuel produced. I think we will see a lot of new technologies being integrated like this in the future. But who knows!!

Aw, man, Dan Zer has figured us evil liberals out! The scam has been revealed. We (gasp!) would like to have a little consideration for clean air and a few undisturbed natural habitats in our national energy policy, all in the absurd belief that it might be a good idea to conserve some of our environment for the benefit of future generations. Of course, let's not look at that as the rational choice it is, but instead equate it to joining the Unabomber fan club or being a bunch of neo-Luddites. Listen, I'm not going to debate global warming any more. The debate's been had, the vast majority of scientists have spoken, and come tomorrow, we inaugurate a president that actually believes in listening to those voices that offer us the best future with regards to both energy independence and a clean environment. You see, we aren't opposed to technology, as some of the more reactionary voices on the right scream from their AM towers or flame from numerous blogs -- we support the growing cheaper and more sensible alternatives to fossil fuels because they: a) would slow or reverse global warming (dittoheads can skip this reason and proceed to "b"), b) nobody likes smog, acid rain, strip mines, or oil spills, c) you don't have to hold the hands of Saudi princes to get access to the sun, wind, tides, or geothermal power,and d) fossil fuels are finite -- they took millions of years to make, and we don't have that long to wait for replacements once we burn through what we have. So if these sound like the arguments of someone who hates a technologically advanced solution, or logic of any kind, feel free to ignore them. Otherwise, drop the rhetoric and consider that there are plenty of good reasons for us all to support transitioning away from fossil fuels towards a more sustainable, technologically more advanced civilization.

I believe that a great deal of the prosperity that American civilization has enjoyed was predicated on an abundance of relatively inexpensive fossil fuels. The "advanced technology" that greenies continuously tout will be a wonderful thing as it proves itself. The major drawback is that we presently have at least 300 million vehicles and pieces of equipment in America that will only run on liquid fuels. I have several in my driveway, one not even paid for yet.

What will be the economic impact if my cars and my truck-driving buddy's 18-wheeler have to remain parked, covered in cob-webs? Do we then bravely plunge into Obama-world where the government tells us all which bus to take in order to get where it (government) will allow us to go?

But beyond all that, it is always risky to base progress on a lie. The Earth is no longer warming, the Antarctic certainly isn't melting, and watch Greenland closely because those glaciers are not sliding into the sea so fast that they will soon disappear.

If the Obamunists loved science, to my mind they would support Bush's manned mission to Mars. We have a God-given opportunity to navigate between the planets and eventually to other stars. By doing so we can avoid extinction events and preserve much of the biota that our planet has uniquely created. We have a duty to do this.

I believe that a great deal of the prosperity that American civilization has enjoyed was predicated on an abundance of relatively inexpensive fossil fuels. The "advanced technology" that greenies continuously tout will be a wonderful thing as it proves itself. The major drawback is that we presently have at least 300 million vehicles and pieces of equipment in America that will only run on liquid fuels. I have several in my driveway, one not even paid for yet.

What will be the economic impact if my cars and my truck-driving buddy's 18-wheeler have to remain parked, covered in cob-webs? Do we then bravely plunge into Obama-world where the government tells us all which bus to take in order to get where it (government) will allow us to go?

But beyond all that, it is always risky to base progress on a lie. The Earth is no longer warming, the Antarctic certainly isn't melting, and watch Greenland closely because those glaciers are not sliding into the sea so fast that they will soon disappear.

If the Obamunists loved science, to my mind they would support Bush's manned mission to Mars. We have a God-given opportunity to navigate between the planets and eventually to other stars. By doing so we can avoid extinction events and preserve much of the biota that our planet has uniquely created. We have a duty to do this.

The debate on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is not over. Plenty of engineers and scientists disagree AGW is happening and their ranks are swelling. Popsci has paid little attention to this side of the debate in its articles(but I am thankful to Popsci for posting these comments). AGW is a popular belief because it's presentation by most media outlets is one-sided, i.e. pro-AGW. Can anyone doubt the media bias????? I can't blame anyone like Mike_R for believing in AGW except that they really should dig alittle deeper into the topic than what is presented by the mainstream. Please see www.icecap.us. Bashing those with whome you diagree, name calling etc, is counterproductive and unscientific.

I am all for clean water and clean air and telling foreign countries they can keep their dang crude. Yes we need to develop our own resources and develop new technologies. Extracting oil from coal can be done cleanly (again, a fact not mentioned in the press). Lets not destroy the integrity of science as an institution by allowing it to used to support unproven "conclusions" about AGW. Debate is healthy and science demands it. We need to see more of this debate in the mainstream.

"What will be the economic impact if my cars and my truck-driving buddy's 18-wheeler have to remain parked, covered in cob-webs?"
-Mike Cook

Why don't we use hydrogen as a straight fuel for both aircraft and cars? To my knowledge, there would need to be very few changes to internal combustion engines (changing the timing in the engine, ect.) and jet engines can burn straight hydrogen already, in fact easier than Jet A kerosene. The only problem is the change in volume of the fuel, as far as I know. Hydrogen is twice as volumous as jet fuel, and as such would require either a higher compression (meaning a different fuel intake system) or bigger tanks (which requires a reformation of aerodynamics.

The best thing about this fuel is that it doesn’t need to be debated. The sources of this fuel are as prevalent as, well, water, and the energy required can be harnessed through other sources such as wave action and solar cells. Coal, while extremely prevalent, has a terrible reputation. Granted, the Hindenburg gave hydrogen a bad name as well, but under the right circumstances anything will combust. Hydrogen gives no emissions, water excepted, and coal doesn’t. Either you vent that CO2 out into the atmosphere or you store it in some way, but CO2 is CO2, and is a pollutant that changes the environment that we depend on for food and supplies.

Now, as to the infrastructure outcry. Whenever hydrogen is thought of as a fuel, people claim that it would take years to get the ability to fuel up at the local gas station. This, in fact, is not true. The technology is already out there, in every station, to fuel up with hydrogen. Again, with minor adjustments, a fueling station will be capable of distributing hydrogen. The same is true with fueling for aircraft.

Even the military advantages of hydrogen are obvious. Using electrolysis, fuel can be manufactured with the minimum of supplies (electricity and water are the only requirements) close to or directly onsite, right where you need it. Even for the civilian sector, the same is true. Electricity and water, and a place to store the hydrogen are all that’s needed.

I find it curious that this great article fails to mention the Great Plains Dakota Gasification Company, located in Bealah, North Dakota. They have been converting coal to natural gas for many years now. The coal is derived from open-pit mines which the state of North Dakota requires be returned to their natural state when done mining, as I observed. Quite impressive! Read more @ www.dakotagas.com/

When I was visiting friends there in 2007, I saw this great plant, as well as many wind turbines, both being built and in service, and several -new- oil wells.

Oh, yeah, this is all accomplished with the greatest environmental controls available, and it is -not- government-run but is run by private enterprise.

TominNewHAmpshire

Well, for the global warming contrarians, instead of useless rhetoric and silly labels like "Obamunist," or "Socialist," I'll answer you with a few facts. Check these links

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/01/21/eco.warmingantarctic/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/01/22/study.forests.dying/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/01/19/eco.globalwarmingsurvey/index.html#cnnSTCText

I found the last article particularly interesting, since it quantifies just how large a majority of scientists agree that global warming is real, and the supermajority that believe it to be the result of human activity.

Now, back to the issue of coal. While I see a lot of overblown partisan hyperbole about how becoming more efficient and cleaner in our energy use will somehow hurt our nation (it's pretty clear that a measured transition away from fossil fuels, beginning sooner rather than later, would actually build our economy and provide sustainable energy solutions for the future), I haven't seen any real response to my list of very real downsides to using coal. Is there actually a community that thinks mountaintop removal, habitat destruction, air pollution, and the other nasty side effects of coal don't argue for a better solution? I know we can't go cold turkey on something that supplies so much of our energy at present, but cleaning up existing coal plants, replacing planned coal plants with wind/solar or even nuclear power, and gradually phasing out the use of coal seems perfectly rational to me.

Btw, I do support expanding the manned space program, so don't go generalizing about all liberals. Having a long view for human survival means supporting sustainability at home, but also not keeping all your eggs in one basket.

Maybe use of electrolysis to create hydrogen and oxygen,
then burn to create combustion, will help ?

Man, all this squabbling. Here we are reading Popular Science, and the comments are predominantly dismissive of scientific method, Luddite, jingoistic or plain ol' ignorant. We now have a president who understands the complex relationships of economics, ecology, environmentalism, politics, heck you name it. Our new president will be dealing with the overriding issue of energy, and although aeronautic fuel is of great importance, it's only one part of the big picture. There is little doubt or argument that mining coal is cheap, but the conversion to liquid and the environmental degradation is extremely costly both immediately and possibly for eons of time. Yes we have a lot of coal, but sooner or later, it will run out. If we were to mine, burn and/or liquify as much as we possibly could, most scientists predict that it would greatly contribute to the ruining of the atmosphere. I think that any new liquid combustible fuel must be considered a bridge fuel. Something to take us out of the petroleum/coal age of the 19th and 20th centuries, and through this one. By then, we should be far beyond combustable fuel energy, and we could have light without heat, boundless energy storage and who knows what else. To get to the stars, we will need an extremely advanced propulsion system, and it will seed advances in earthbound propulsion systems. Anti-gravity? Mag-lev? Who can know what will be discovered over the next few decades.
Considering all of the known dangers inherent in dealing with coal fuel, I think the real bridge fuel could well be bio-fuels, and one in particular. Hemp! It grows like a weed, needs no fertilizers or pesticides, and produces very incendiary fuel in the seeds. Heck, we used to roll "bombers", and fly on 'em back in the '60s, why not propel real bombers with hemp? And what's the reason for using 2.5 billion gals. of fuel/yr? Oh yeah, we spend more than the rest of the world combined, for our national security. Let's not forget that there are many who feel that our needs should increase every year to maintain a healthy economy.
It is my contention that if America were to really invest in alternative energy, conservation, recycling and back off of the idea of an Imperial American World order, or whatever nonsense has been guiding our country for the past several decades, we can lead the world through the peaceful use of science in a way that will assure a future for coming generations of humanity. Steven Hawking (I'm sure his intelligence will be debated), has stated emphatically that if humanity does not destroy the planet too soon, it's real future is beyond the bounds of Earth. That is centuries in the future. By that time, intelligent minds will know that the age of fossil fuels was thankfully a relatively short one in the evolution of mankind, and one that humanity survived. Or else.......

Mike_R restated Al Gore's talking point position that the debate on global warming is over, thereby proving my point, the Warmists are not scientists but ideologues. In science, theories are always open to debate, particularly when a better one come along. A couple of Scandinavians have come up with a better explanation for climate change that better fits the known data and they have proven its key process in laboratory tests. Global warming due to changes in trace amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere defies laboratory verification.
Obama is a lawyer, he is not trained at all in science or technology. He has already stated he believes in Global Warming and wants far reaching laws and policies to turn around this non-existant "problem". This Popular Science article shows that there are serious repercussions to blindly accepting this alarmist doctrine, National Security being one.

Most of this ideological banter is irrelevant to the issue. No one suggests liquid coal would be used for the next 400 years, or even 50-years. What the military is looking for is a 'stop-gap measure' for a few decades. And ideally, the primary problem (increased CO2) can be cured much faster than that.

The technology that replaces liquid coal *may* be one of those suggested here (like bio-gas), or it may well be something like organically grown petroleum. But if anyone here believes they could have a commercial-grade supply of bio-gas available in 5-years - tested and proven effective in today's jet-fighters - then get cracking! You are about to become a billionaire! But the reality is that all the ideas put forth here as arguments against pursuing coal-fuel are MANY years off from meeting the need.

Even if we forget aircraft, we cannot today produce even a fraction of the bio-gases (like ethanol) we need for automobiles. So how could we magically start producing enough for aviation too? Plus, while coal-fuel WORKS in current jet engines, bio-fuel does NOT. Virgin's bio-fuel 747 is a great start in that direction, but this technology is a long way from being viable for today's military - even assuming we had enough bio-fuel to spare.

Even if the US military downsizes, and becomes more conservative with its fuel use, it will still need a stable supply of whatever fuel it burns. Ideological comments about 'Imperial America' do not address this fundamental issue. Nor do arguments about where sea levels will be in 100 years. If you really care about climate change, find a solution for commercial aviation! Their use of oil dwarfs the military's. They don't use bio-fuel is because there are no viable alternatives - yet. THIS IS THE POINT.

Science and humanity do not LEAP from one technology to the next. We get there in baby-steps. Some paths will turn into blind alleys, and some technologies become obsolete before they become viable. But that is how technology progresses.

Someone may find a way to make coal-fuel as 'green' as petroleum, but if the technology has been abandoned due to short-sightedness, then we will never know.

A good analogy for coal-jet-fuel is today's bio-fuels for cars. Using corn and other food stocks for bio-fuel is absurd! It causes food inflation and shortages, and has no hope of supplying world demand. Plus, when fertilizer and farm fuel is counted, it may actually be WORSE than burning petroleum! But no one claims this is the 'solution' - it is only a stop-gap technology. If we did not START with corn and sugarcane, then the infrastructure and investment would not exist, meaning research would be MUCH slower. The same applies to coal-fuel. If you don't start, then you will never get to the next stage.

As long as everyone realizes its limitations and drawbacks, I believe it is worth pursuing coal gasification as an 'option'. If necessary, punitive costs could be applied to motivate manufacturers to find ways to clean it up. This would drive research and development. As much as I do not like increasing ANY greenhouse gas output, this seems like a better alternative to doing nothing.

So I would support more research and pilot programs for coal gasification. However, I would also support reasonable and productive environmental limitations and challenges placed upon it to help drive continued R&D.

The spin-offs from such research could eventually help reduce both pollution and CO2 from coal-fired power plants, which is a MUCH bigger problem than the US military. With China completing hundreds of new coal plants each year, I welcome aggressive research into how to make coal cleaner. But this simply won't happen unless there is some driving force behind it.

A US Air Force coal-fuel program could be just what the doctor ordered. As long as there is REAL incentive for finding ways to improve it over time, I think it worth pursuing.

@StarLine: "Maybe use of electrolysis to create hydrogen and oxygen, then burn to create combustion, will help?"

Unfortunately 'electricity' is an even bigger problem than aviation. A shortage of electricity is WHY hundreds of new coal-fired power plants are build around the world every year. So you would be burning coal to produce electricity, then using that electricity for electrolysis to create a fuel, and then burning that fuel. I don't know the numbers for this, but assume the efficiency would be far less (hence more CO2) than just burning coal-fuel in the first place!

When fusion-power or a similar 'clean' technology is available decades from now, we may produce both fuel and clean-water from seawater. Windmills and solar panels are a nice start, but it will be a LONG TIME before there is green-power to spare. So for now, using more electricity equates to releasing more greenhouse gases, which is exactly the problem.

Of course the best solution would be a process that converts organinc substances including fossil fuels directly into electricity. It would cut oil usage by at lest 70 percent and CO2 emmisions by at least that much and possible a lot more. We know it is possible because every organic cell mkes electricity and does not contain any steam generator. Eels build up as much as 600 volts. if some one can tie up the patents it would make them much richer than Bill Gates ever even thought about. Imagine running your car on Light Crude and the only output is a sludge of Carbon, trace elements and water that has to be dumped every 3000 miles and can be easily processed for its elements of sequestered underground. Your milage is about 100 miles per gallon.

Well, for the global warming contrarians, instead of useless rhetoric and silly labels like "Obamunist," or "Socialist," I'll answer you with a few facts.

A recent survey of scientists, described in a January 19, 2009 article on CNN (search for "global warming survey" -- I've repeatedly tried to post the link, but the site administrator apparently treats relevant links to science articles on other sites as spam) found that 90 percent of geoscientists believe that global warming is occuring, and over 80 percent believe it is due in part to human activity. Another article posted on CNN two days later described conclusive evidence of warming in the eastern portion of Antarctica. Each day new evidence supporting global warming becomes available for the public, but here on this web page you keep seeing posts from irrational skeptics who say that those of us who believe the science are "ideaologues," followed by ad hominem attacks on a particular poster (I seem pretty popular at the moment).

Anyway, I found the global warming survey article particularly interesting, since it quantifies just how large a majority of scientists agree that global warming is real, and the supermajority that believe it to be the result of human activity.

Now, back to the issue of coal. While I see a lot of overblown partisan hyperbole about how becoming more efficient and cleaner in our energy use will somehow hurt our nation (it's pretty clear that a measured transition away from fossil fuels, beginning sooner rather than later, would actually build our economy and provide sustainable energy solutions for the future), I haven't seen any real response to my list of very real downsides to using coal. Is there actually a community that thinks mountaintop removal, habitat destruction, air pollution, and the other nasty side effects of coal don't argue for a better solution? I know we can't go cold turkey on something that supplies so much of our energy at present, but cleaning up existing coal plants, replacing planned coal plants with wind/solar or even nuclear power, and gradually phasing out the use of coal seems perfectly rational to me. Btw, I do support expanding the manned space program, so don't go generalizing about all liberals. Having a long view for human survival means supporting sustainability at home, but also not keeping all your eggs in one basket.

My science fiction detector sounded a bit of an alarm when I got to this part:

“…including recycling CO2 by running it back through the Fischer-Tropsch process to produce more fuel (after all, carbon dioxide has carbon in it, the same energy source as fossil fuel)…”

Okay, so I'm the wrong kind of engineer to really argue the finer points of Fischer-Tropsch processes, and I do believe you can combine CO2 with hydrogen over a catalyst, but I have a couple problems with the implication the author is making.

First of all, there's the tiny issue of adding the "hydro"(gen) to the carbon to make hydrocarbons. In order to hydrogenate CO2 you must have hydrogen. If we had a cheap and easy carbon-neutral method to produce hydrogen ( nuclear fission, oh wait that's not popular right now) we could theoretically make the transition to the "hydrogen economy" (forgotten buzzword?) and run smaller vehicles on that instead.

Secondly, the author appears to be editorializing a bit and also claiming that the "energy source in fossil fuels" is carbon. Please correct me here where I'm wrong, but the basic combustion of hydrocarbons goes like this:
CxHy + (x+y/4)O2 + energy => CO2 + (y/2)H2O + energy
or,
hydrocarbon + oxygen + energy = CO2 + water + more energy
In other words, the energy required to split the bonds in the reactants is much smaller than the energy given off by the formation of the bonds in the products. Carbon is NOT an energy source; in fact the best hydrocarbons for combustion have the lowest carbon percentage (think methane vs. wood).

I would appreciate a little more accurate wording in the presentation of basic science from my Popular Science articles.

Jesse
Minneapolis, MN

P.S. - I really would like to see where my understanding is wrong, if it is, so feel free to respond.

This is tough, our military needs fuel to continue on. I would have to believe we have enough fuel for our military if we somehow weened our cars and such off gasoline, but that won't be happening by 2016.

http://www.ehow.com/members/suzyjenkins.html

So the Air Force is doing its best to spark a domestic fuel industry that would be devoted, most likely, to digging new coal mines and building the country’s first major coal-to-liquids
http://www.viptravesti.net

We could easily move towards a biofuel solution if we could legalize industrial hemp. It doesn't have to raise food prices, because it can be grown on land where food crops can't.

Hell, if you want a solution that takes us off imported oil for the Air Force, make it exclusively grown by the government. That's still a hell of a lot better than either using coal.

I found a post about porting games to Mac OS X by a guy named

Nose surgery

breast reduction