ICP Parking Lot/Sustainability

While the United States has emitted more carbon-dioxide than any other country in its quest to increase its standard of living and domestic and global production, it has been openly reluctant to combat the issues of global climate change. In 2003, during the Administration of George W. Bush, the government embarked on an ambitious project called Futuregen, which was designed as a public-private partnership to build a 275 MW near zero-emissions coal power plant in Illinois at an estimated cost of $1.8 million. One of the stated goals of the project was to share the resulting clean coal technology with other companies and developing countries so that reduced carbon emissions could be combated. In later discussion the government decided to build multiple smaller coal plants and agreed to let the private companies they would partner with, keep the technology that was developed, thereby removing one of the major intended benefits of the project - collaboration and sharing of technology. In January of 2008 the project's funding was canceled.

In March of 2009, the new Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, expressed interest in re-opening the project and combining it with a larger portfolio of research plants that are being developed collaboratively with other countries. There is hope that the new administration will reinstate the project and the original plan to share the technology in order to help developed and developing countries alike, reduce carbon emissions.

A more recent and landmark development in the US Government's stance on climate change has been the introduction of the Waxman-Markey Bill, a carbon cap and trade program, in the US Congress. The Bill is entitled the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES). The bill is designed to create limits on carbon emissions and create tradeable permits for carbon emissions that can be bought and sold on a national market. This internalizes the externalities of environmental and climate damage caused by carbon emissions and helps to level the playing field for alternative energy technologies, creating larger markets and more new jobs for US citizens while helping the US rid its dependence on foreign sources of oil.

The Obama Administration has helped the US embark on a new path towards sustainability and is advocating for a more responsible position in the global fight against climate change.

Special Cases: Possible topics of interest

• Convert carbon dioxide into methane
  • A storage solution studied by Bruce Logan's team at Pennsylvania State University in University Park (http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/04/using-bacteria-to-convert-clean-energy-to-methane-for-storage.php)
• Hydrogen Production
  • “Scientists from the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and North Carolina State University (NC State) are in the process of developing new green technology that could lead to production of hydrogen from nitrogen-fixing bacteria.” (http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/energy-hydrogen-producing-bacteria/)
    • patent-pending
    • Licensing information can be obtained by contacting the ARS Office of Technology Transfer or the Office of Technology Transfer at NC State.
  • “scientists pick out a gene that inactivates the bacteria’s hydrogen uptake system. This leads to the release of all the hydrogen produced previously. The bacteria can’t recycle these hydrogen. So the hydrogen they produce can be captured and used as a fuel whose byproduct is water and heat.” ((http://www.alternative-energy-news.info/energy-hydrogen-producing-bacteria/)
  • Absorption of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide (http://cleantech.com/news/4194/bacteria-makes-biofuel-and-soaks-po)