To the Editor:Let's be real: "clean coal" is a marketing slogan not a technological reality. Coal does currently provide us with a reliable source of electricity but at an astronomical price that is hidden from us consumers. Maybe you pay for it with your child's asthma. Maybe you paid for it with your father's heart attack or your grandmother's stroke that took her speech away. Maybe you lost a baby to SIDS on a particularly bad air day.
Emissions from coal fired-power plants are a leading cause of smog, acid rain, global warming, air toxins -- and premature deaths. The EPA estimates that over 30,000 Americans are dying prematurely each year due to power plant emissions -- the majority of which are coal-powered. This doesn't even address the high mortality rates associated with the mining process.
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