It is a common idea among many Americans that coal as a
major industrial fuel is dead, or at least dying, and cleaner fuels, like wind
and solar energy, and natural gas, are taking over. There is some truth there; but
there are other influences on coal’s recent decline.
Less costly natural gas has become the fuel of choice in
power plants and for other industrial uses, not because of the natural relative
price of the fuels, but because of the cost of regulatory demands on mining and
burning coal that require enormous investments that have priced coal higher
than natural gas. Remember former President Barack Obama’s prediction: “So if
somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It's just that it will
bankrupt them.”
These regulations produced the closing of more than 400
coal-burning power plants, which dropped the demand for coal, and altogether
put 63,000 people in the coal industry, electric production industry and
related support industries out of work in just the last few years.
At just the right time hydraulic fracturing (fracking)
became popular, after lying mostly dormant since its first commercial
application in 1957, and that produced a boom in natural gas production at
attractive prices to compete with coal.
Many think burning less coal is a great thing, because
burning coal fouls the air and is dangerous to our health, a “truth” which
loses importance when you know the actual infinitesimal improvement in air
quality derived from burning less coal.
However, considering all those factors, and paraphrasing a
famous quote attributed to Mark Twain, the rumors of coal’s demise have been
greatly exaggerated.
Of course, coal will never regain its former dominance among
industrial fuels; time and technological/industrial evolution would just as
certainly, although much more gradually, have eaten into coal’s popularity
without the help of the Obama War on Coal.
But the regulatory adjustments of the Trump administration,
the growing acceptance of the idea that the climate change/global warming mania
is dramatically overstated, the reality that coal is still the best fuel for
many things, the fact that many countries that do not have domestic coal supplies
depend upon it for fuel, and the improvement in coal-burning technology all
point to a continued market for American coal.
And let’s not forget that fossil fuels made up 81 percent of
the fuels used to produce electricity in 2016, and coal is still the primary
fossil fuel in electricity production.
Industry insiders, like Murray Energy CEO Robert Murray, see
a partial resurgence in coal. “Coal will grow back,” he told Fox Business
Network’s Stuart Varney. “But we’re in a decline right now.”
He went on to say that Trump “can bring back at least half
of those [63,000 lost] jobs as the economy grows and as he ends the regulations
on coal.” He noted that we have not had a level playing field in coal; “the
government has been picking winners and losers.”
And he told Maria Bartiromo, also on Fox Business Network, former
President Obama closed 411 coal-fired plants, and that the Clean Power Plan
which Trump ended recently, would have closed 56 more plants. That, he said,
would have caused a steep spike in electric rates.
“As [Trump] grows the economy [and] brings jobs back to
America, coal will participate in that growth because we are one-sixth the cost
of a windmill and one-fourth the cost of natural gas,” Murray said.
Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio, said, “The coal industry knows
and understands how to mine coal … and protect our environment. We don’t do it
the way it was done 50, 60 years ago.”
Here are a few pieces of evidence:
* Reports from the Kentucky, West Virginia and Virginia
coalfield regions say that mines are cranking back up and miners are being
rehired. Train yards are seeing cars filled with coal moving through them in
greater numbers.
* Bluefield State College recently held a Job Fair to
immediately fill 85 open coal positions at Wyoming and McDowell
county mines that mine coal used in making steel.
* Fox News reports that in Wise County, Virginia, a “long-awaited
revival is under way in this beleaguered Central Appalachia community where
residents see coal as the once and future king. Trucks are running again.
Miners working seven days a week cannot keep up with current demand.”
* Coal exports through Hampton Roads last month rose more
than 50 percent from last year's level, led by a nearly five-fold increase at
Newport News' Pier IX, according to the most recent Virginia Maritime
Association statistics. "A lot of mines are open again," said Harry
Childress, president of the Virginia Coal and Energy Alliance."
Few if any argue that the coal industry will return to its
former greatness, but it will certainly endure for many years at a lower level
if natural forces are allowed to work, free of politically correct environmental
engineering.
When you replace regulations resulting from selfish
ideological goals with a business regulatory level based upon common sense,
good things can happen.
And for areas of the country like ours, that have suffered
so greatly from Obama’s over-zealous EPA, this is good news.
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