Take a second to list the top green energy sources.
I bet coal didn't make your list. It should. New technologies being developed - including carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) - have the potential to make coal not just our most abundant and affordable energy source, but a green one too.
Today coal provides approximately half of our nation's electricity and employs thousands of Americans. Contrast that with renewable sources of energy, which supply only a tiny portion of our current energy mix, about 7 percent. In the near - and even distant - future, technologies like solar and wind will not be able to meet our country's energy needs alone. Renewable and alternative fuels and technologies are vital tools in our quest to improve our nation's carbon footprint and energy security, and Business Roundtable is strongly supportive of their development. However - as we recently outlined in our Unfinished Business report - in order to develop a cost-effective and realistic path to sustainability, we also need to leverage the domestic resources that currently provide power to millions of Americans in the cleanest, most efficient way possible.