U.S. President Barack Obama and President Hu Jintao of China have announced several agreements for the two countries to cooperate on clean energy. The deals could help smooth the way to a climate change agreement in which both countries agree to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

China has been dragging its heels over strict cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, especially with the U.S. also so far failing to commit to such cuts. But if China doesn't cut its emissions it will be impossible to meet goals for averting dangerous climate change.

One thing that could help--reduce emissions and convince China to agree to cuts--is sharing the latest technology with China, especially technology for making cleaner power plants. The agreements seem to be a step in that direction.

One deal in particular seems promising. Scientists from both countries will cooperate on developing cleaner coal plants through a new U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center, which will be jointly funded with $150 million. What's more, a number of U.S. and Chinese corporations have agreed to cooperate, including Peabody Energy, which will help with a project celled GreenGen, and GE Energy, which will help with coal gasification. Both projects could lead to cleaner coal plants that could be paired with technology to capture and sequester carbon dioxide.

Other significant agreements include one to develop natural gas resources, which could reduce greenhouse emissions because burning natural gas releases about half the carbon dioxide as burning coal. Another aims to improve the efficiency of buildings, industry, and consumer appliances. To address growing emissions from cars, both countries will work together to establish standards and roadmaps for the development of electric vehicles.

FutureGen's carbon-free coal vision may soon be more than a clean dream

Potential Energy has learned that Energy Secretary Steven Chu met with representatives of the FutureGen Alliance today, reinforcing positive signals from Chu two weeks ago that the troubled project could be revived. The public-private partnership to prove the integration of coal gasification, carbon capture, and sequestration technologies was killed by the Bush Administration in January 2008 using what Congressional investigators have shown to be specious accounting.

In an email to TechReview today, Department of Energy press secretary Stephanie Mueller confirms that Chu and the Alliance had a "good discussion" and that the Secretary Chu "believes that the FutureGen proposal has real merit":

Secretary Chu believes that investment in carbon capture and storage research and development is critical to meeting our energy and climate change challenges. Unfortunately, the prior Administration simply walked away from FutureGen after years of work ... In the coming weeks, the Department will be working with the Alliance and members of Congress to strengthen the proposal and try to reach agreement on a path forward.

Michael Mudd, FutureGen Alliance chief executive, struck a confident tone after the meeting about the prospects for reviving the project. "It is not certain but I think it is highly likely. We have a vehicle for funding it through the stimulus package. We have interest of the Obama Administration in seeing this go through. There's growing interest in reducing CO2 emissions. All of the aspects are there pointing towards [reviving the project]," says Mudd.

One attraction of the project is that it is more "shovel ready" than average--particularly for a capital-intensive energy installation. An environmental impact statement already issued under the Bush Administration, and a Record of Decision (ROD) from DOE formally approving the project seems to be in the works. "Step one is for new sec of energy to issue the ROD. With that we can do a detailed design and start procurement. If that happens quickly we can begin the heavy construction next year, and even some light construction this year," says Mudd. The plant could actually start up in as little as three years from now, with "90% carbon capture and sequestration from Day One," according to Mudd.

Which would be just in time for Obama's re-election campaign.

Canada's Stephen Harper is pushing carbon capture and nuclear over renewable energy.

Canada's Conservative government unveiled a budget yesterday with an energy balance distinctly different from that contemplated by President Obama in his economic stimulus package. "Green Causes Left Out of Budget" is how the Toronto-based National Post headlined its coverage. Toronto Star columnist Chantal Hebert writes that environmentalists may be the only "constituency, friendly or hostile to the Conservatives, that will not get a piece of the multibillion-dollar stimulus package."

Whereas Obama's $819 billion stimulus package proposes giving renewables a big boost, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's C$33 billion (US$27 billion) Economic Action Plan would leave unchanged Canada's EcoEnergy support program for renewable energy. Canadian Wind Energy Association president Robert Hornung predicts that the program may run out of cash before the end of the coming fiscal year, blunting the industry's ability to draw investment amidst a superhot U.S. market.

"Our ability to compete with the United States for investment in wind energy projects and manufacturing opportunities will decline as a result of this budget. At a time when the United States has made measures to support renewable energy deployment a key component of its plans to stimulate the US economy, Canada is moving in the opposite direction."

What takes top billing in Harper's plan is, instead, carbon capture and nuclear energy. Government-owned Atomic Energy Canada Ltd (AECL) gets C$351 million to support, among other projects, development of the next generation of its CANDU heavy-water reactors. A C$1 billion clean-energy fund will finance carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects over the next five years. The CCS projects could be key to sustaining the massive investment in tar-sands-based oil production in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Budgets like Canada's are exactly what prompt some renewable-energy advocates to oppose CCS and nuclear energy: these technologies may have a role to play in boosting energy independence and reducing carbon emissions, but, as Canada's lopsided spending plans show, there is a danger that they will divert funds that need to move toward even cleaner power sources.