Carbon producers urged to control emissions

Industries worldwide that produce carbon dioxide must agree on the best ways to handle and store their emissions, then quickly move forward, attendees at a conference heard Tuesday.

The price tag for what's known as carbon capture and sequestration will be enormous and will require private-public partnerships, not just in the United States but in other developed and developing countries, presenters at the 7th Annual Conference on Carbon Capture and Sequestration emphasized.

Carbon dioxide release into the atmosphere is seen by experts as a major contributor to global warming. Recent analyses of the proposed Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act of 2008, introduced in the U.S. Senate, project that without a major push on advanced carbon capture and storage technology, power prices by 2030 would jump 65 percent and cost the national economy as much as $1.5 trillion.

"Coal will maintain a significant share of the world's power generation capacity well into the future," said Lori Perine, vice president, U.S. Government Affairs for the French company Alstom Utility Speaker.