Fast Facts on Clean Energy vs. Dirty Coal

Clean energy: it's faster, cheaper, and better for Montana than a dirty coal-to-diesel industry. Here's why:

CLEAN ENERGY: FASTER

• Montana could have several clean energy projects up and running more quickly than any coal-to-diesel plant.
• For electricity, the recently-completed Judith Gap wind farm is a good example: it was constructed in less than one year.
• For transportation fuel, we need only look to our neighbors in North Dakota: They have already put two bio-diesel plants into the pipeline in the time Montana politicians have been talking about dirty coal-to-diesel ideas.
• Biodiesel plants are already being built around the country with proven technology. The engineering, design, financing and permitting for even one 20,000 barrel per day coal-to-diesel plant would take many years. The country's only proposed pilot plant (to even see if the technology works) is not scheduled to go online until 2013.

CLEAN ENERGY: CHEAPER

• The recently completed Judith Gap wind project in Montana is producing electricity at a cost lower than NorthWestern Energy's current cost-of-supply.
• Clean energy plants are coming on-line around the country with the capital investment and lead times that are eight times lower than a coal-to-diesel plant.
  
• The estimated cost of a 25,000 barrel per day coal-to-diesel plant is $2 billion. A 1 million BPD plant would cost at least $60 billion. In comparison, the cost estimate to build a 25,000 BPD biodiesel plant is $230 million. That's 7 or 8 plants instead of one coal-to-diesel plant.
  

CLEAN ENERGY: BETTER

• Investing in biofuels plants in rural communities across Montana spreads broad prosperity across our state. Building one industrial synfuels complex in coal country concentrates any economic benefit it may have to one area.
• There is not enough available water in Montana to meet the consumption needs of the dirty coal-to-diesel facilities proposed by Governor Schweitzer.
• A 1 million BPD dirty coal-to-diesel complex would require a 7-fold increase in the amount of Montana coal production. It would require over 3,500 acres of land per year to be stripped and taken out of their current land use. That's 221 square miles over the life of the mines.
• Remember, in 33 years, Montana has only released the surety bonds for 216 acres of mined land after finding they had been fully reclaimed, when 62,000 acres have been permitted for strip mining.
• A 1 million BPD synfuels complex would produce 50,000 tons per year of Sulfur Dioxide, 80,000 tons per year of Nitrogen Oxide, 25,000 pounds per year of Mercury (into the plant waste stream). That is not to mention the 73 million tons of waste ash and 1.4 million tons of sludge it would produce each year. Clean energy projects like biofuels plants and wind farms avoid these large-scale impacts to public health.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

• Download a copy of our footnoted 6-page white paper analyizing coal-to-diesel plants
• If you would like a fully-cited version of this page, e-mail info@northernplains.org