Underground C[O.sub.2].(Inside Track)(carbon dioxide)

The high price of oil has caused those responsible for energy generation to think increasingly about coal as a fuel source, mainly because our nation's coal reserves are much more abundant than our supplies of petroleum. However, fears of the byproducts of burning coal, most notably the emission of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, have many people worried. Though the connection between climate change and man-made production of greenhouse gases is disputed by many scientists, much of the public at large has become convinced that burning fossil fuels inevitably must lead to a rise in our Earth's temperature.

Efforts to prevent global warming have produced some unorthodox proposals, including one to capture the C[O.sub.2] emitted by new coal-burning power plants so it can be stored underground. Proponents of the idea have set 2020 as the target date to bring new plants using this technique online. Among these is John Thompson, who directs work on this issue for the Clean Air Task Force, an environmental group. Without capturing C[O.sub.2] and storing it underground, claims Thompson, "we're not going to have much of a chance for stabilizing the climate."

One major corporation that is developing C[O.sub.2,] capture-and sequestration equipment is G.E., which signed a ...