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Cue the lux

Posted on April 15, 2010April 15, 2010 by Staff

Wednesday on campus, the chancellor, the university’s energy task force, anti-coal activists and those who have worked in defense of the Appalachians began discussing in earnest the end of the use of coal at the co-generation plant on Cameron Avenue.

It is an idea whose time has come sooner than planned, but it is undeniably the right path.
As efficient and well-run as the Cameron Avenue plant is, continuing to use coal for fuel at a university whose research is steadily building the case against it runs counter to the mission of UNC.

We’re not just talking about the climate-change research being done by Jose A. Rial and others at the Department of Geological Sciences, but the economic, legal and social science research by scholars going back to Howard Odum.

And just Tuesday night at the U.S. Senate forum on campus, any political scientist would have caught that the majority of candidates said we have to move away from coal and other fossil fuels and look to ways we can use this state’s vast resources to leverage a smarter, more-efficient distribution of energy.

Two top contenders, Cal Cunningham and Elaine Marshall, put it succinctly, both saying “there is no such thing as clean coal.”

We are still fighting regulatory battles to reduce what Tennessee and the Ohio Valley send us in air pollution, and coal ash contaminants in unlined landfills across the state are a growing concern.

The mining of coal is a dangerous and destructive business. Mountain-top removal of coal is destroying the Appalachians at an alarming rate.

We head into Earth Week – or whatever you care to call it – with what we know to be right confronting what we know to be.

You can’t walk the North campus without noticing the tradition of harmony with nature – the “noble grove” in the title of the current exhibit at Wilson Library. There is something in the gut that says ending coal use is the Carolina thing to do.

The chancellor and many of those who will make this decision are scientists. As such, they are well aware that the plural of anecdote does not equal data. But the data is there, scattered throughout the university, from the school of law to the department of epidemiology. What it tells us, and what those advocating for the end of coal tell us, is that it is time to act.

Converting the plant won’t be easy, but it should be quick.

Finding ways to make that kind of leap, to confront the challenges and to lead the way, is what universities are all about.

2 thoughts on “Cue the lux”

  1. EDFmarie says:
    April 18, 2010 at 5:19 pm

    Once again, students are leading the way on one of the most important issues of our day–cutting carbon emissions and investing in clean energy. The pressure UNC students put on university leadership can transfer into a greater pressure on our national decisionmakers to pass the legislation that will make clean energy investment easier and more affordable. If our Senators passed a clean energy bill, efforts like those at UNC would be supported by millions of dollars of new funding for clean energy and energy efficiency, and could benefit from nationwide momentum on clean energy development. So students who want to support change on UNC’s campus can also help by contacting Senators Burr and Hagan and asking them pass the clean energy bill. It will ease and invite the kind of energy transformation UNC needs.

  2. Samuel E. Reynolds says:
    April 23, 2010 at 2:08 pm

    Where is the science supporting all the claims from Liberal Arts Majors?

    Oh, yeah- there are none.

    Pseudo problems- much easier to solve than real ones!

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