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Comment by kube-system | Hacker News Reader

No, the criticism isn't because people get caught up about CO2 -- it's because "cleaner than other coal" is a very low bar to meet to be calling something "clean" full stop.

Also "clean coal" is not a type of coal being burnt (although that does matter too) but pollution control systems added to coal plants.

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Anthracite burns clean enough to use in a pizza oven. If your neighbor told you he was going to install a new furnace and offered you the choice of it burning wood pellets or anthracite, from a smell standpoint you should absolutely choose the anthracite.

Anthracite, in these regards, is very different from bituminous coal.

>Anthracite burns clean enough to use in a pizza oven.

Yeah, so does wood, which is horribly polluting.

The smell of wood might be nice for flavor, but that's beyond the point of anthracite being clean. That particulate pollution from wood burning is severe compared to the smoke you'll get off anthracite, which is virtually nonexistent.

Regardless of how good it might be at being the cleanest dirty thing, it's not what the US trope of "clean coal" refers to anyway. Anthracite is not used in the US to generate power because it is too expensive.

And both are very different from not burning anything.

Undoubtedly. Doesn't change the fact that one kind of coal burns smokeless with a clean blue flame while the other will cover everything for miles in a film of soot and tar.

Considering the mercury and arsenic in all coal, wood is preferred in ovens.

The doesn't cause acid rain version is called "clean" and that seems pretty fair to me when the other version causes acid rain.

It is still dirtier than all of the alternatives we have.

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