Environment & Energy

n2doc

(47,953 posts) Sat Jun 14, 2014, 10:09 AM Jun 2014

It's not Obama's war on coal, it's geology's war on coal

As the Environmental Protection Agency moves ahead with limits on carbon pollution from the nation's coal plants, you'll hear a lot of industry outrage about Obama's "war on coal." Don't believe it.

The truth is, the U.S. coal industry is already in dire straits, including here in Colorado — and it is due primarily to geology, not politics.

Coal is undeniably a non-renewable substance. We have been mining the easily accessible deposits for the last 150 years, and the planet isn't making any more on a time scale that matters to humans.

As a result, the U.S. coal industry is in serious financial distress — right now — months, and likely years, before any EPA carbon regulations actually go into effect.

Even if the EPA were to be eliminated tomorrow (not something we advocate), the U.S. coal industry would still likely be largely winding down in the next decade or so.

more

http://www.denverpost.com/politics/ci_25957845/its-not-obamas-war-coal-its-geologys-war

1 replies

= new reply since forum marked as read

Highlight:

It's not Obama's war on coal, it's geology's war on coal (Original Post) n2doc Jun 2014 OP

three facts about U.S. coal industry pscot Jun 2014 #1

pscot

(21,024 posts)

1. three facts about U.S. coal industry

Reply to n2doc (Original post)

Sat Jun 14, 2014, 03:38 PM

Jun 2014

Here are three facts about the U.S. coal industry:

Fact No. 1: The top three U.S. coal companies are currently running in the red and reporting large losses: For 2013, the No. 1 U.S. coal producer, Peabody, reported a loss from continuing operations of $286 million, No. 2 U.S. coal producer Arch Coal reported a loss of $641 million, and No. 3 U.S. coal producer, Alpha Natural Resources, reported over $1 billion in losses.

Fact No. 2: Coal company stock prices have plummeted in recent years, and the top three U.S. coal companies had already lost 80 percent to 97 percent of their stock value compared to their highs in 2008 — before the EPA announced regulations on carbon pollution from existing coal plants.

Fact No. 3: U.S. coal production is at its lowest in 20 years. It is entirely possible the U.S. is past its peak coal production with 1.171 billion tons of coal in 2008. In 2013, U.S. production fell below 1 billion tons for the first time since 1993. Moreover, the largest U.S. coal mines are expected to begin playing out in the next decade or two.

Reply to this discussion