And candidate Romney has a whole bunch of Texans backing him up in his belief in coal power because they are trying to beat the EPA’s new clean air regulations by getting three new coal-fired power plants approved before the new standards take affect.

“Clean coal” is to Energy as 9/11 was to Saddam Hussein.

I say this despite the fact that on September 20 the U.S. Department of Energy announced “major milestones” for a Decatur, Illinois, clean coal project. That project is all about a carbon sequestration demonstration facility and the opening of a National Sequestration Education Center.

The sequestration project plans to be able to store 1 million tons of CO2 per year to demonstrate the “feasibility” of carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) technologies.

The quote from Charles McConnell, Assistant Secretary for Fossil Energy, U.S. Department of Energy states,

“This project is an important part of the Obama Administration’s investments in clean coal technology and an all-of-the-above energy strategy that will help ensure we develop every source of American energy….Continued research into Carbon, Capture, Utilization and Storage technologies will help continue reducing the costs of clean coal projects and make sure that the U.S. maintains the lead in this important clean energy industry.”

The project plans to capture CO2, concentrate it and pipe it to an injection well for underground storage in sandstone formations more than 2,100 meters (7,000 feet) underground. I’m not sure what milestones have actually been achieved but the plant will not be operational until the summer of 2013. I would consider that a far more important milestone than the opening of a education centre. But having said that lots of question marks remain about this project and I’ll tell you why.

As I have written before, the economics of CCUS technology without significant government subsidy, make no sense. CCUS remains a black hole that sucks in government money to prop up a continued desire to maintain the fossil fuel industry. Believe me, without subsidies, industry players wouldn’t even give CCUS a second thought.

What is needed is a cap and trade system with a price put on carbon that gets the attention of fossil fuel industry players. A cap and trade system would work like the proverbial carrot and stick to motivate the industry players to alter their behaviour because potential profit could be realized.

So let’s, once and for all, put the “clean coal” misinformation myth to bed along with:

Smoking doesn’t cause cancer.

President Obama was born in Kenya.

Measles, Mumps, Rubella vaccines cause autism in children.

That there is no scientific evidence for global warming.

And that “creation science” is science.

Oh, and that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and was responsible for 9/11.

Now here’s the fantasy.

Presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, back in December of 2011 during an interview on science talked about cold fusion and work being done at the University of Utah. He was referring to the Fleischmann/Pons experiments that led to the 1989 cold fusion announcement. Here is a transcript of his comments:

“I do believe in basic science. I believe in participating in space. I believe in analysis of new sources of energy. I believe in laboratories, looking at ways to conduct electricity with — with cold fusion, if we can come up with it. It was the University of Utah that solved that. We somehow can’t figure out how to duplicate it.”

I’m glad he added that last sentence since it appears the University of Utah had “solved” cold fusion in his previous sentence. Is it coincidence that Mr. Romney sees cold fusion as a solved technology because it comes from an educational institution in the state of Utah? Is this faith-based science?

Did Mr. Romney not know that the University of Utah discontinued experiments in cold fusion two years after the 1989 announcement?

Did he not know that the University of Utah allowed its cold-fusion patents to lapse in 1998?

Did he not know that the original researchers, Pons and Fleischmann went to France to continue research for a subsidiary of Toyota and that the research funding from Japan stopped in 1997?

Don’t get me wrong, I think cold fusion would be an incredible technology if it could be pulled off. But every reference to it invoking proof comes with caveats. It’s always in the lab, or somebody has written a paper, or posted experimental results.

Take for instance the proof claim using a National Instruments video,  a talk given at a recent conference. This video clip isn’t about cold fusion. It’s about measuring results from experiments using technology created by National Instruments, in particular, LabView, a new software application.

The video provides no proof of cold fusion’s viability other than to describe it as controversial and talk about someone’s masters thesis that lists 184 examples of “positive” experimental results. At the end of the talk the presenter states “we don’t judge, we measure.”

At this conference National Instruments sponsored a panel of experts and a LENR was demonstrated on the show floor. But the “expert” panel hyped the technology rather than demonstrated commercial viability. Representatives from companies like Defkalion Green, that purport to be ready to bring their Hyperion cold fusion reactor to market, did more talking than showing.

That seems to be the nature of cold fusion proof these days. A few websites, blogs and chats extolling a product and technology that fails to deliver. I’d like to see it if it is real. And I am certain Mr. Romney wants it to be as real as his positions and policies on so many other subjects for which he purportedly has expertise or receives expert advice.