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Sure. The Democrats made sure it was an "economically bad choice." Coal is cheap. They were making it very expensive. It's called "regulation." Raising the price of something through regulation is what Democrats do to ensure it's demise. That's what they did to the coal industry.
God forbid, they have regulations on coal sludge and dumping coal waste in the waterways. I guess certain people and their children are expendable. Profit over the living. So what if they die early or get cancer as long as conservatives can save a buck.
You write as if exporting coal is a good thing. It is not. Read my previous post. Appalachia's mountains are being destroyed in order to sell coal to China and other third world countries. The game isn't worth the precious candle.
Oh, now we're destroying the mountains! SAVE THE MOUNTAINS! SAVE THE TREES! SAVE THE WHALES! SAVE THE AIR WE BREATH!
I do not begrudge anyone who gets subsidies For their health insurance because the idea of people dying on the street and kids dying of cancer and other diseases because of lack of medical coverage bothers me. Maybe not you, but it does me. That is a topic for another day.
Republicans literally want to kill 1,000's of Americans and give kids asthma to support the coal corporations that give republican politicians campaign money (while they claim Obama is the bad guy.)
frakking has released a ton of natural gas that is cheaper then coal.
BTU for BTU it's not cheaper than coal, it's probably averaged about 50% more over the past few years and that is even before we consider the price spike. It's goiing to be interesting to see what the markey does when they start exporting a lot of this gas.
The newest natural gas plants are more efficient and preferable for filling the role of intermediary plants which is role they have always filled. The same tech that makes them more efficient is being worked on for coal and if it comes to market NG will lose that advantage. The other thing is is if you are going to invest hundreds of millions or even billions into a power plant with the expectation it will produce power for the next 6 or 7 decades it's risky investment with the threat of regulations.
Oh, now we're destroying the mountains! SAVE THE MOUNTAINS! SAVE THE TREES! SAVE THE WHALES! SAVE THE AIR WE BREATH!
That the best you got??
I suppose one could manage without whales, and even without mountains.
But "the air we breath (sic)"?
Think about it.
I take it you've never seen mountaintop removal. Once again, check out Google Earth's views of southeastern Kentucky and southern West Virginia. Educate yourself, so you won't further embarrass yourself here.
So to answer your question, given current trends it will do absolutely nothing to the economy.
The problem with this statement is we know from history the stability of the coal market, the natural gas market is whole other ballgame and is still quite volatile. I don't think that will change especially when they start exporting huge quantities of it.
so If we use more coal on Wed then we did on Tue that means coal is no longer in a decline?
In this case yes because you need to look at what happened the days previous to that. There is a plethora of issues that have caused the slump in coal over the past 9 years. Lower natural gas prices, the Obama era regulations that prematurely closed many plants, the threat of new regulations and some unusually warm winters that suppressed both the price of coal and natural gas.
There was glut of coal on the market because the industry never had a chance to adjust. That's behind them. With the demand for more exports and the unusually cold winter things are going to drastically change the amount of coal used and the subsequent mining activity.
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