One way to think about these ads might be to understand that first and foremost most people don’t react well to being lectured to and don’t react well to outrage. A more effective approach is to let people come to their own conclusion which I think these ads are trying to accomplish. Here’s my take on Joe’s questions:

- I assume most people (including many policymakers) don’t really understand climate or electricity and coal’s role in both. Most folks would also like there to be an easy answer to a big problem like climate change. Given this, most people (including policymakers) are particularly susceptible to the clean coal message: we already rely on it, it’s clean and getting cleaner every day. It’s the same “go back to sleep, we’ll take care of it” message that most of the fossil fuel industry has been peddling the past two years.

- As long as policy makers and can use the myth of clean coal with some credibility it’s easier to avoid making the hard decisions that have to be made in order to solve the climate crisis.

- As I see it, the goal of these ads are not to do everything (pass legislation, etc), but mainly to help in that first and critical step of making ‘clean coal’ not a credible excuse for inaction. Once it is debranded we can have an honest conversation about the present and likely future costs of relying on dirty coal.

In terms of the images used, it may not be a literal interpretation of what is or is not clean about coal, but it’s symbolic. Given that most folks don’t really understand the substance of the climate issue, it’s just a way to make the issue more accessible. I suppose they could run a campaign that talks about parts per million and SOX and NOX but I don’t think anyone would really understand.

You’ve got a video camera and computer and youtube. make yours and do better than the Reality people did.

But their medicine business interest are best served by more people smoking. So when I see closeup images of pleasant faces looking into the camera saying things like “I admit it, I love to smoke”

Well this may connect Pfizer with prospective clients, but is makes smoking an acceptable habit, and I think emotionally encourages the habit.

Easily confused humans meet diabolically deceptive influence peddlers. Yikes!

That said, the question remains: What public policy goal are you ultimately trying to push?

I think that the ads should mention that there isn’t a single production-scale clean coal plant in the whole world as additional proof.

And see, there’s the flaw in these ads– if they really wanted to take on clean coal, why not try, say, facts? They could’ve made a simple, point-driven, fact-based ad for probably a fraction of what this posturing drivel cost. Example:

Text and/or narration: We’ve heard a lot about ‘clean coal.’

::montage of a zillion people, including McCain and Obama, talking about ‘clean coal.’::

Back to text/narration: But did you know there’s not a single production-scale clean coal plant in the world? That’s right. Not one. Industry experts say that the technology needed to make coal clean is probably ten to fifteen years away. We need technology that can help us now, to make our rivers and streams cleaner and stop global warming. And right now…that’s not clean coal.

…you get the idea anyway!

> “The way I’d sell the story is by pointing out the lie, the hoodwink, the scam. It’s the Bernie Madoff of energy.”

That works for me. I don’t think this topic is the place for satire or cutesy humour. Counter adverts need to focus on the fact that the energy industry is lying – say that plain and clear to people and they’ll remember that message next time the lie is told.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71kckb8hhOQ

From my perspective it’s one of the funniest, and most effective commercials I’ve ever seen against “clean coal.” However, this ad is certainly cynical, and carries the flavor of the middle of the Bush years, when it was hard to hope for anything.

In general, I think that such advertising is primarily effective for online communities who read a lot more, but not television. In general, they are only good bits for preaching to choir.

Published by the
SOUTHERN FUTURE SOCIETY
1996
Edited by Jack D. Arters, Ed.D.
Conference Director
The truth is, all natural rocks contain most natural elements. Coal is a rock.
The average concentration of uranium in coal is 1 or 2 parts per million. Illinois
coal contains up to 103 parts per million uranium. A 1000 million watt coal
fired power plant burns 4 million tons of coal each year. If you multiply 4
million tons by 1 part per million, you get 4 tons of uranium. Most of that is
U238. About .7% is U235. 4 tons = 8000 pounds. 8000 pounds times .7% =
56 pounds of U235. An average 1000 million watt coal fired power plant puts
out 56 to 112 pounds of U235 every year. There are only 2 places the uranium
can go: Up the stack or into the cinders.

“Modern electrostatic precipitator plants are capable of operating at greater than 99.5% collection efficiency but can still release 35 lb/year of uranium as just one component in almost 3 million tons of ash vented through stacks. In addition to this radiological species, all the radon in coal is released during combustion. An estimate for average Rn-222 release is about 2 Curies/year for each 1000 MWe coal fired facility15.”

Since a reactor full fuel load is around 11 tons of 2% U235 and 98% U238, and one load lasts about 10 years, and what one coal fired power plant puts into the air and cinders fully fuels a nuclear power plant.
Compare 4 Million tons per year with 1.1 tons per year. 1.1 divided by 4 Million = 2.75 E -7 = .000000275 =.0000275%. Remember that only 2% of that is U235. The nuclear power plant needs ~44 pounds of U235 per year. The coal fired power plant burns coal by the trainload. The nuclear power plant consumes U235 in such small quantities yearly that you could carry that much weight in a briefcase. The full fuel load and the years between fueling varies from reactor to reactor, but one truck can carry the weight of a full nuclear fuel load.See also: http://www.ornl.gov/ ORNLReview/ rev26-34/ text/ coalmain.html
and
http://www.ornl.gov/ info/ ornlreview/ rev26-34/ text/ colside1.html

And i see that coal is responding with a campaign speech by Obama. So maybe we need to get rid of the electoral college. Without it, coal-mining states wouldn’t be swing states and have so much influence on campaigns.