Comments on: The social cost of carbon https://www.habitablezone.com/2018/10/08/the-social-cost-of-carbon/ Fri, 03 Apr 2026 22:41:18 -0700 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: ER https://www.habitablezone.com/2018/10/08/the-social-cost-of-carbon/#comment-42351 ER Tue, 09 Oct 2018 04:19:39 +0000 https://habitablezone.com/?p=73877#comment-42351 Coal, even "Clean Coal" which is usually laced with nasty trace impurities like sulfur, is carbon, and pure carbon combusts with oxygen to form CO2, a greenhouse gas. Other fossil fuels like methane (CH4) and petroleum distillates are hydrocarbons (carbon-hydrogen chains) that oxidize into CO2 and H20, so for the same amount of energy you get less carbon dioxide. There's a social cost to every technology, but it rarely is calculated by those who market the technology. Automobiles are a cheap and efficient way to travel, but the infrastructure needed to support them takes up an enormous amount of resources. Nuclear power is very inexpensive, but processing spent fuel is extremely expensive. I could go on. Coal, even “Clean Coal” which is usually laced with nasty trace impurities like sulfur, is carbon, and pure carbon combusts with oxygen to form CO2, a greenhouse gas.

Other fossil fuels like methane (CH4) and petroleum distillates are hydrocarbons (carbon-hydrogen chains) that oxidize into CO2 and H20, so for the same amount of energy you get less carbon dioxide.

There’s a social cost to every technology, but it rarely is
calculated by those who market the technology. Automobiles are a cheap and efficient way to travel, but the infrastructure needed to support them takes up an enormous amount of resources. Nuclear power is very inexpensive, but processing spent fuel is extremely expensive. I could go on.

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