Coal and the other fossil fuels are still very important

June 25, 2025

Anyone who has lived in, or spent much time in this region knows and understands the importance of the coal industry to its development. Without coal, so much that occurred and that we enjoyed would not have happened.

Tens of thousands of jobs and who knows how much money passed through the region due to the mining, sale and transportation of coal mined here to other places.

Over the next several years, Bluefield became the center of activity resulting from the coal boom that occurred several decades ago. It was the finance and shopping center for the southern West Virginia and southwestern Virginia coal fields. People came here from towns miles away because of Bluefield’s role in the coal industry, and the things it offered to them.

How many of us remember driving along Bluefield/Princeton Avenue and seeing dozens or hundreds of coal cars on the railroad tracks loaded with coal moving out of the railyard, and dozens more empty cars on their way back to be refilled?

This lasted for many years, and the area prospered during that time.

However, as life evolves, things change. New and better ways of doing things come to be, and the old ways gradually fade away. 

This process is slow, gradual and not very painful. The other side of that story occurs when some factions start pushing for change before its time, and with things other than the natural replacements.

Unfortunately, the latter process has been the catalyst for what has occurred in the southern West Virginia and southwestern Virginia region’s coal industry.

The idea that burning fossil fuels like coal and oil was damaging to the environment took hold and resulted in what some have called “a war on coal,” which produced the closing of coal burning power plants, and the large decline in the need for coal. At least in the United States.

But science does not agree with the idea that we have too much CO2 in the atmosphere, and that it is harmful. In fact, quite a few scientists say that we need more, as much as two times the amount of CO2. They say that would be a great benefit to plant life. Plants and trees consume CO2 and emit oxygen. Having more plants and trees is a good thing.

During President Donald Trump’s first term the U.S. became energy independent and provided energy sources to other countries. This highly robust level of production was so strong that it lasted well into the Biden administration, despite Biden’s efforts to stifle it. The U.S. produced a record amount of energy in 2023, and out-performed that the following year. 

Eventually, the Biden administration’s efforts did cripple the energy industry. Other countries were still burning coal, and needing coal, oil and gasoline, but they were getting it from other countries, resulting in an economic punch in the gut to U.S. businesses.

The problem with the green energy solution that so many prefer is that while using green energy does not burn fossil fuels or add CO2 to the atmosphere, producing the elements that gather wind and solar power do. All of the materials that must be mined, then transported, and put into production use great amounts of gas and oil.

Now that Trump has been re-elected to the presidency, his administration is working to reinstate the previous philosophy on fossil fuels.

A West Virginia organization — Friends of Coal — based in Charleston, is excited about this change. “The recent decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to roll back burdensome greenhouse gas and toxic emissions regulations marks a pivotal moment for America’s energy future — and a long-overdue reprieve for the coal, natural gas and oil industries that power our nation,” it said.

In its June 20 email, Friends of Coal included a couple of other bright spots:

“The Trump administration on Wednesday formally reinstated the National Coal Council, an advisory group focused on fossil fuels that existed for more than three decades before lapsing under the Biden administration. The Department of Energy in a Federal Register notice restored the group.”

“President Trump took two major steps this week to end the 14-year old ...Democrat war against the coal industry and cheap electricity. Although greens have promised to sue, they are unlikely to succeed as the moves have pretty much been pre-approved by the Supreme Court.”

Some other states, even some that are not coal producers, understand how important it is.

In South Carolina, the state legislature is considering the new S.C. Energy Bill. The bill provides for “all of the above forms of energy for electricity 

generation.” One of the bill’s supporters noted that “the lowest cost, most reliable power that the Low Country has had delivered for over 80 years is from Santee-Cooper with over 60% of that low-cost electricity coming from the primary energy of coal.”

While it is very unlikely that these changes will spur a recovery in the coal industry that puts it back where it once was, things should improve locally, at least some.

And, like other changes the Trump administration supports, these changes will take some time to emerge as is the case with gasoline prices. 

Coal is still a valuable asset with many beneficial uses

November 19, 2024

Over recent years the amount of coal used in the US for producing electricity has dropped dramatically. This same decline can be seen across the globe, with 100 countries that have either gone coal-free or have set 2040 as a phase-out date.

The environmental movement is responsible for most of this, prompted by the Paris Agreement in 2015, where 75 nations focused on doing away with coal use by 2050. The environmental faction tells the story that burning coal is a major factor in what they say is the dangerous over-abundance of carbon dioxide (CO2) in Earth’s atmosphere.

To correct this problem, we must stop using fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas to produce electricity, power vehicles or other uses. Even if it is true that we have too much CO2 in the atmosphere — and more than a few scientists argue that position isn’t true — this perspective ignores that fossil fuels contribute to our lives in other ways that are quite useful in addition to producing the power on which we rely so heavily.

And let’s not ignore the idea of many scientists that the level of CO2 in our atmosphere not only should not be reduced, but should be doubled to promote the growth of plant life. Plants and trees consume CO2 and release oxygen, which is critical to human life, into the atmosphere.

On this topic, Mining Digital tells us that “The demise of steam coal — also known as thermal coal — has been well documented, as investors shy away from the fossil fuel that fired the Industrial Revolution and has been an energy mainstay pretty much ever since, save for the past decade or so. Yet one corner of the coal market is thriving: metallurgical coal, otherwise known as coking coal, and vital for making steel.”

Coal is a critical part of steel, and steel is a huge factor in so many things, such as in buildings, as reinforcing rods in concrete, in bridges, tools, ships, trains, cars, bicycles, machines, electrical appliances, furniture, and weapons.

Oil is also used in many things, like plastics, fertilizers, petrochemicals crayons, dishwashing liquids, deodorant, eyeglasses, tires, ammonia, lubricants, coolants and paints.

So, you see, these fossil fuels have other uses as well as their contribution to electricity production and propelling vehicles and other devices of various descriptions. But the Biden/Harris administration, with its myopic view of reality and the manic anti-fossil fuel attitude of the left, wants to destroy fossil fuels, and especially coal, which has been, and can still be, so valuable to our region.

While coal use is still declining, and coal-fired power plants are fewer and fewer, the rate of that decline has slowed recently, as power demand is rising for datacenters and manufacturing entities.

And a forecast from S&P Global Commodity Insights points to this as a lifeline for coal power. “But tech companies are building power-hungry datacenters to support new artificial intelligence applications. Additional demand from new datacenters will double in just a year, to 47,448 GWh (Gigawatt hours) between 2024 and 2025, and rise more than eightfold by 2030 to 199,982 GWh.”

President-elect Donald Trump named former New York Rep. Lee Zeldin to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). It is thought that the EPA will ease regulations affecting fossil fuel-fired power plants.

Trump said of Zeldin, who served in the House from 2015 to 2023, that he will ensure “fair and swift” deregulatory decisions. The result of this will be a boon to American businesses and still maintain the highest environmental standards.

Zeldin said in a recent statement that, “We will restore US energy dominance, revitalize our auto industry to bring back American jobs, and make the US the global leader of AI. We will do so while protecting access to clean air and water.”

E&E News offered this idea of what will happen. “Some of the most stringent rules enacted by the Biden administration will likely end up in the dust bin, such as the agency’s regulations to reduce climate pollution from power plants, according to analysts. Other standards may survive in a weakened form, like the administration’s rules to lower methane emissions.”

“I think the power plant rule is pretty easy for them to revoke,” said Jeff Holmstead, who served as EPA’s air chief under President George W. Bush. “There’s really no one in industry who supports that rule. People just think that EPA was entirely unrealistic.”

Fortunately for those businesses and individuals who support the continued use of coal, not only for power production, but also for the other uses it has, the onset of the Trump/Vance administration is a breath of fresh air. 

Reversing the Biden administration’s mindless restrictions on coal, oil and other fossil fuels will allow the US to regain its position as energy independent, bring back to our country the sale of coal and gas that was sent to other countries by Biden’s orders, and bring down the needlessly high prices for gasoline and diesel fuel.

These changes will not restore the thriving coal industry of a few decades ago, but will allow its use for energy production as well as other positive purposes that have recently come to light.

Fossil fuels do much, much more than just produce harmful CO2

November 1, 2022

While President Joe Biden and those in the green movement are working hard to rid the world of fossil fuels because of the CO2 they produce, a broader understanding of all the things fossil fuels do might help our perspective.

Oil, natural gas, and coal, are fossil fuels that we use for heat, electricity and to power vehicles. However, they are also a source of raw materials that are used in the manufacturing of many products. Among these is plastic. “Most of the plastics we use are of synthetic origin from petroleum,” according to Global Recycle. “They are simple to manufacture, and the processes are low cost.”

Yes, it is true that too much plastic in many ways causes some problems. But in other ways plastic is a very useful material. Think of all the ways plastic is used today, and all of the products that we would not have without it. 

The most common use of fossil fuels is to power vehicles and planes with gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel. But of the 42.6 gallons of oil in a barrel, only about 35 gallons are used for these fuels. The rest of the crude oil is used to manufacture other useful products.

Some of the other materials are petroleum jelly, asphalt, synthetic rubber, paraffin wax, fertilizers, pesticides, detergents, paints, upholstery, carpets, floor wax, insecticides, tires, nail polish, dresses, basketballs, soap, anesthetics, body lotions, deodorants, toothpaste, and even our food is preserved with a little help from fossil fuels.

During the campaign in New Castle, New Hampshire back in 2019, Biden said: “I want you to look at my eyes. I guarantee you, I guarantee you we’re going to end fossil fuels.” But that wasn’t all. He added, “No more subsidies for the fossil fuel industry. No more drilling, including offshore. No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period,” he said of his energy policies if he won the election. “It ends.”

If he succeeds, there will be a hefty price to be paid by the people he was elected to serve, replacing thousands of jobs and the long list of products that we buy and use today that we get from fossil fuels. Biden has engaged in fulfilling his promise, cancelling the Keystone XL pipeline on January 20, 2021, and other actions that followed.

The idea that fossil fuels actually have beneficial qualities may shock some people. But it is the truth. Even some, or maybe many, of those who don’t buy into the catastrophic theme surrounding the use of oil, natural gas and coal may not realize the broad range of things that fossil fuels give us.

The negatives seem to be the controlling theme. Fossil fuels are bad because they produce CO2, which is dangerous to the environment, and to our existence. Nuclear energy and hydro energy produce no CO2, which is good. But many people also oppose these two alternatives.

Wind and solar power, on the other hand, are championed by the anti-fossil fuel group as the saviors of our planet. And if we don’t replace fossil fuels with them in a fairly short time, we are doomed, they tell us.

Yet, these same people oppose the processes involved in producing windmills and solar panels, like mining and great amounts of industrialization.

The author of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels, Alex Epstein, has a new book out. Fossil Future: Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas — Not Less.

In chapter 10, he wrote that “Since 1980, the percentage of humanity living on less than $2 a day has gone from 42 percent to under 10 percent today.” This is attributed to “increasing productivity, which is driven by the increasing and expanding use of fossil fueled machine labor and the enormous amounts of mental labor it frees up.”

Making life easier and less expensive for millions of people across the globe, including the poorest of us, is certainly a positive development. And continuing improvement in pollution-control technology will make it possible for even more of the poorest on Earth to use fossil fuels “to lift themselves out of poverty with less and less pollution,” Epstein wrote.

“All of this means more first light bulbs, more first refrigerators, more first rewarding jobs, more first years with a consistently full stomach, more first years drinking consistently clean water, more first years being comfortable no matter what the weather,” he wrote.

He explains how much more there is to the story of fossil fuels than the CO2 they produce. And as technology advances, cleaner burning fossil fuels result. America produces the cleanest crude oil in the world. And we should also remember that CO2 is fertilizer for trees and other plant life that then produce and release oxygen into the air. 

Billions of people rely on inexpensive fossil fuels for energy, and that number continues to grow. But the more expensive “renewable” energy sources are beyond their financial means.

So, while technology works to clean up fossil fuels, and to make the cleaner renewable sources more functional and affordable, we need to utilize all the benefits that fossil fuels provide.

America’s energy picture is very good, and getting even bette

In 2019, for the first time since 1957, America’s energy production exceeded its energy consumption, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports. And energy exports exceeded imports for the first time since 1952.

Fossil fuels — coal, natural gas and petroleum — accounted for 93 percent of U.S. energy production in 1966, and despite the arrival of new fuels for energy production, fossil fuels still accounted for 80 percent of our energy production last year.

Over the last decade coal has been replaced as the leading fuel for energy production, due to both natural and unnatural causes, by natural gas, which has seen a dramatic increase over that same period. Hydraulic fracturing — fracking — has spawned great increases in both oil and natural gas production, making natural gas more affordable, thus favored for electricity production.

Renewable sources — primarily wind and solar — have seen production increases over the last two decades, but are currently responsible for only about 12 percent of electricity production.

The U.S. has maintained the title of number one producer of natural gas since surpassing Russia in 2011, and it became the number two producer of oil, surpassing Saudi Arabia, in the last couple of years. Further, the U.S. now exports more oil than most OPEC countries, and exports liquified natural gas to 38 countries.

One definition of energy independence is when a country produces more energy than it consumes. By this definition, the U.S. is energy independent. However, things are frequently less simple than they seem. Even though the U.S. exports excess energy, it still imports energy, and is therefore is not purely energy independent. Some experts contend that it is important that we continue to do business with other producers, and buying from them as well as selling to them is smart, they say.

There are currently 3 million workers in good-paying U.S. jobs in the natural gas and oil workforce, many of whom work in skilled trades and science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields, according to the American Petroleum Institute (API). Among those jobs are construction workers, operating engineers, pipefitters, plumbers and boilermakers, as well as data analysts and computer scientists. Another 5.86 million jobs are in the supply chain for the oil and gas industry.

The API further notes that average annual pay in the industry is near $100,000, and that is almost $50,000 higher than the national average. And, there is the projection of 1.9 million additional jobs by 2035. API also reported that “the energy industry is poised to provide stable livelihoods to an expanding workforce – one increasingly comprised of veterans, women and minorities.”

Globally, NS Energy ranks oil as the most utilized fuel at 39 percent of all fuels; followed by coal at 28 percent; natural gas at 22 percent; hydroelectricity at 6 percent; nuclear at 4.4 percent; geothermal, biomass and waste at 0.4 percent; and solar at 0.03 percent.

Clearly, there is a world-wide need for the fuels America produces, and combined with the country’s needs, the energy sector is a provider of a lot of good-paying jobs. 

Enter, stage left, Joe Biden, Democrat nominee for President of the United States. In the Democrat primary debate, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said: "I'm talking about stopping fracking as soon as we possibly can. I'm talking about telling the fossil fuel industry that they are going to stop destroying this planet — no ifs, buts and maybes about it." To which opponent and former Vice President Joe Biden said, “So am I.”

Not long after agreeing with Sanders, his campaign issued a retraction. And more recently, Biden told union workers, "I am not banning fracking. Let me say that again. I am not banning fracking.”

He told his Democrat comrades one thing, and wooed his union voters with an opposite message. Which one should we believe? Maybe Biden himself isn’t sure.

A Biden-Harris administration — or a Harris-Biden administration, whichever it is — can only do great harm to the burgeoning oil, gas, and coal industry that has such a bright future providing needed fuels to the world, and jobs to the U.S.

Biden has pledged to the climate change faction that fossil fuel use in the country will end by 2035. Bye-bye 5 to 10 million industry jobs. Including fracking. That should make the folks in fracking states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Colorado and Texas very unhappy.

But replacing fossil fuels with renewables is not as easy as we are led to believe. Those technologies are not currently up to the job, and producing solar panels and wind turbines is a huge, and not environmentally friendly, challenge.

Producing elemental silicon pure enough for solar PV cells requires an enormous amount of electricity, and turning raw silicon into finished wafers pure enough for solar cells involves several toxic and corrosive materials. 

Windmills kill thousands of flying creatures annually, and require enormous amounts of concrete. Both solar and wind utilize large amounts of land dedicated to the production of electricity. And worn out enormous turbine blades are not recyclable, meaning they will forever clog up landfills.

Biden and others supporting renewable energy as an easy and non-problematic solution to supposed climate change are deceiving the public.

Here’s some good news on climate change and the U.S. energy picture

Was it a breakdown of distribution components? Did information editors snooze through this big news? What was it that caused the recent important news about climate change to not be widely distributed?

Normally, when data show a new hottest year on record; or a big increase over the previous month, or the same month in the previous year; or represent a sequence of warming months or years, that’s a big story. But not this time. What’s up with that?

Well, the answer is that the climate change news did not fit with the climate change narrative preferred by those who promote cataclysmic damage to the Earth’s atmosphere unless we make dramatic, inconvenient, expensive, harmful, and virtually useless changes to the way we live and work.

Since the Little Ice Age ended in the 1880s the Earth has warmed by about 0.8 degrees C, a level of warming that many regard as serious, even catastrophic. However, that same approximate level of warming occurred three times prior to this one, in the Minoan, Roman and Medieval warming periods. Somehow, the Earth managed to not blow up, and its plant and animal life survived. And the fact that Earth survived runs contrary to the manic warnings of the alarmist faction about our fate under such conditions.

The recent news that hardly anyone is aware of demonstrates how Earth’s temperatures fluctuate; alternately rising and falling, over varying lengths of time, and has occurred for at least thousands of years.

The most recent available data comes from the GISTEMP Team, 2018:GISS Surface Temperature Analysis. The source for this report is NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and the data shows that from February of 2016 to February of 2018, global average temperatures fell by 0.56 degrees C. That was an even larger drop than the previous two-year drop from 1982-1984, when the global temperatures dropped by 0.47 degrees C.

The recent temperature drop, called the Big Chill, represents the reversal of about 70 percent of the previous 0.8 degree C increase in global temperatures over the last approximately 120 years. This is important; however, two years of lower temperatures are not sufficient to label it a complete reversal of the warming trend. But it does demonstrate the changeable nature of global temperatures.

Other relevant information not widely reported consists of an analysis of computer climate models as designed by the climate scientists on the alarmist side of things. Writing for Investors Business Daily, Nic Lewis’ and Judith Curry’s study shows the alarmists models are tilted upward on the temperature scale. The planet, they say, is far less sensitive to increases in CO2 than the climate models predict. The result is that Earth will warm less than the models predict, even if the levels of CO2 we put into the atmosphere do not decrease.

Thus, the global warming scare that we are continually being beaten up with is not currently a looming danger. Instead, it is an exaggerated picture of normal temperature fluctuations.

The majority of the information media, which largely sides with the predictions of catastrophe for our environment, mostly reports information about climate when it suits their political perspective.

* * * * *

On the energy front, there is also good news. Bloomberg Markets reports, “Selling more than two million barrels a day of U.S. crude overseas may soon be the new normal.”

The U.S. exported 2.33 million barrels a day in the third week of April, which is the highest export number in the last 25 years, according to the Energy Information Administration. That is a significant increase from earlier in the month, when average exports were 1.76 million barrels a day. U.S. total output has increased to 10.6 million barrels a day, Bloomberg reported.

This increase is attributed to the shale production revolution, which largely comes from light, sweet West Texas crude.

The U.S. is moving from the world’s largest importer of crude oil, and is about to displace Russia as the largest producer of crude in the world.

The coal picture, while improved from the over-reaching Obama administration, does not look as good as the oil picture. However, a new discovery could produce some positive impacts.

The American Geosciences Institute notes: "Rare-earth elements (REEs) are used as components in high technology devices, including smart phones, digital cameras, computer hard disks, fluorescent and light-emitting-diode (LED) lights, flat screen televisions, computer monitors, and electronic displays. Large quantities of some REEs are used in clean energy and defense technologies."

A new project with the goal of being able to extract rare earth elements from acid mine drainage at coal mine sites in the country holds some promise. West Virginia University and the National Energy Technology Laboratory are focusing on developing a less expensive method for extraction, and to increase domestic supplies of these elements, which now are primarily available only from China.

If successful, this project will not only provide a strong domestic supply of the increasingly valuable and useful elements, but will also have a positive impact on the waste produced from past and present coal mining operations.