Originally Posted by Hamwich
...As for carbon capture, there are certainly some small-scale proofs of concept in operation such as the one in Iceland, but it seems pretty clear to me that it's nowhere near cost-efficient enough to enable coal fired power stations to be run cleanly, otherwise there would be people pouring money into developing more of them, especially as the cost of wind and solar is dropping so fast. When it's so cheap to use solar and wind, why bother with the complexity and cost of carbon capture?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levelized_cost_of_electricity


The people in the business tell me coal + CCS is now competitive with nuclear in pricing - and of course not subject to the vagaries of season / time of day / weather vs most renewables. Of course a Carbon Capture Scheme costs power / reduces efficiency, hence the global reticence to add their costs to bills. That might all be moot compared with current natural gas prices...

M3W5sp 2015, MSCC, MTWC, Oxon UK