Environmentalists Propose $50 Billion Buyout of Coal Industry - To Shut It Down

cartechboy writes "What's $50 billion among friends, right? At least Felix Kramer and Gil Friend are thinking big, so there is that. The pair have published an somewhat audacious proposal to spend $50 billion dollars to buy up and then shut down every single private and public coal company operating in the United States. The scientific benefits: eliminating acid rain, airborne emissions, etc). The shutdown proposal includes the costs of retraining for the approximately 87,000 coal-industry workers who would lose their jobs over the proposed 10-year phaseout of coal. Since Kramer and Friend don't have $50 billion, they suggest the concept could be funded as a public service and if governments can't do it maybe some rich guys can — and the names Gates, Buffett and Bloomberg come up. Any takers?"

Comments

This is more than a little bit naive.

[stonecypher]

For one, more plants would just spring up. Even if part of the buyout was "you may never go into coal again," someone else may. The economic structure of energy is why coal is still king, and buying out the current players won't change that.

For two, the cost of shutting that industry down does not cover the cost of starting new energy industries to replace it. Or were we just going to go without 37% of our electricity?

For three, coal works efficiently and predictably at far smaller scale than most energy technologies. Many of the locations coal services today cannot be practically services by other generation methods.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Bengie]

If you buy up all of the coal mines while you're at it, you'll not only drive up the price since it's all have to be imported, but the time taken to rebuild all of those plants would take quite a few years, during which time other competition would have moved in, making it much less lucrative to start a new coal power plant.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[NatasRevol]

Well if the $50B includes buying up the lands/rights where coal is, no one else could go into coal.

But I think $50B towards wind/solar would help replace coal more than trying to block it out.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Crowdsource it. At $300/stupid environmentalist, or $8 for every person on earth. The slush alone above the $50 billion you'll raise ought to be plenty.

Oh wait- $8 is more than *half the population of the planet makes in a week*.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[PlusFiveTroll]

There are many things that won't move on. Metallurgical coal for example. You'll drive up the price of other goods associated with the products made with it. That is ignoring that the power companies own many of the coal mines. You not only have to pay for the coal mine, but the loss of power generation directly.

TL;DR: Article is ignorant of how the coal industry works.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Joce640k]

For two, the cost of shutting that industry down does not cover the cost of starting new energy industries to replace it. Or were we just going to go without 37% of our electricity?

Yep. Any plan which doesn't include this is a non-starter.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[ganjadude]

These people are just like PETA, they want everything to be the land of unicorns but they dont think about what doing the change will do to the rest of the world.

they dont think about the unintended consequences Sure lets just close down the major energy supply for most of the world, without a plan in the short term to replace it. We can all go 10-20 years without reliable electric right??

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[icebike]

But I think $50B towards wind/solar would help replace coal more than trying to block it out.

Exactly.

Put a quarter of that money (money that none of these groups have, they were planning to use YOURS), into research on wind and solar, and storage, and you will be doing the world far more good.

Besides, the net ripple effect would require far more than 50 Billion.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[OakDragon]

For two, the cost of shutting that industry down does not cover the cost of starting new energy industries to replace it. Or were we just going to go without 37% of our electricity?

I picture vast fields of hipsters pedaling bolted-down fixies with generators attached.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Anonymous Coward]

The article is ignorant of how basic economics work.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[HornWumpus]

So long as you are honest about what is a subsidy. Business expenses being deductible is not a subsidy. Taxes on gas that are used to pave roads are not a subsidy on gas.

Those are both examples of non-subsidies that have been called subsidies.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[dj245]

For three, coal works efficiently and predictably at far smaller scale than most energy technologies. Many of the locations coal services today cannot be practically services by other generation methods.

I think you have that backwards. Coal plants under around 250MW are generally not profitable, and a vast majority of this size have been shut down already. The bar is moving towards 500MW as being economically viable. I can count the number of new coal stations in the US build in the past 5 years on one hand. Compare that to the 1970's when a new coal plant was being built every month. The environmentalists need to learn to quit when they achieve "good enough". Coal today is just as clean as other forms of energy when you factor in all the externalities. Those externalities come in different forms however and it is easy to count 1 form of environmental damage when comparing power plants while ignoring others.

Re: This is more than a little bit naive.

[icebike]

Putting NO money into research guarantees zero success and zero results.

I have no idea why you brought that up. With advances in battery technology and solar technology being made (and posted here on /.) almost WEEKLY, all of it funded by someone's research dollars, why would you suggest research only leads to failure.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[bws111]

What makes you (or anyone else) think this is even remotely possible? Suppose you manage to buy 10% of the coal mines, and shut them down. What do you suppose will happen to the price of the remaining mines?

These 'ideas' (along with other laughably stupid ideas like Google 'buying' the entertainment industry) always seem to miss one important fact: nobody is required to sell at all, much less sell for some pre-determined price.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Alsee]

The WOC folks are attempting to use force

If someone offers you a pile of money for your home, and you decide to sell it, it's wild ideological nonsense to say they're taking your home by force.

-

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[interkin3tic]

Oh dear god. People are really framing poor old coal as a persecuted entity we've declared war on, and people are actually swallowing it? And a google search reveals you're not joking.

I believe that people are pushing clean energy in an attempt to get rich, since that's what every industry does including coal. But I can't be more open-minded than that when you resort to such bald orwellian tactics.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Anonymous Coward]

TL;DR: Article is ignorant of how the coal industry works.

These wankers are ignorant on how the whole economy works. The prices they quote are at market equilibrium, but guess what's gonna happen when there are billions of demand in the market ?

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[JDS13]

Absolutely right. It's so-called "green" energy that gets real taxpayer subsidies, with capital contributions, taxpayer-funded rebates, loan guarantees, accelerated depreciation, purchase mandates, and (to name just one egregious example) the insane Zero Emission Vehicle credit system that creates a situation where electric cars actually increase net CO2 emissions (not that that matters).

And how will we heat our homes on a cold, dark, windless winter night? And get hot water?

The idea that $50 billion in capital would be squandered in this way boggles the mind. The people who came up with this press release probably have never run more than the $50 in their checking accounts.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[rnturn]

``Article is ignorant of how the coal industry works.''

I suspect the authors are totally aware of how the coal industry works. That's what they're trying to fix. Like you, I didn't take the time to read the whole article (maybe later) but I was appalled when I had to fly over West Virgina years ago and saw the damage to the forests (take the trip in a small plane so you can see the effects close up) that acid rain and the beginnings of mountaintop removal was causing. It makes you sick to see it and it's only gotten worse. I have to wonder if the metallurgical need for coal couldn't be satisfied by some of the extraction methods that are less destructive to the environment. Mining will always be messy but is something like mountaintop removal really necessary? If we think it's okay to take a huge area and render it uninhabitable by human beings -- like what's happening to parts of Appalachia -- then I guess we'll all get what we deserve. All in the name of cheap power. (And I don't know about you but my electric power rates go up -- never down -- every year regardless of the amount of coal that we're clawing out of the ground.) Then do we use the $50B to relocate all the people in Appalachia to other parts of the country where they won't be poisoned? That won't work either.

Personally, I'd like to see coal powered plants disappear as fast as humanly possible. Unfortunately, until we can create a critical mass of renewable power that can be intelligently shuffled around to meet local demands, we're kind of stuck with it. Unless we can work up the political will to take the first (and second) steps. The coal industry would like that to never happen.

Re: This is more than a little bit naive.

[HornWumpus]

You are arguing with a straw man.

The point is that putting billions into research doesn't instantly produce new researchers and that there is an existing research budget.

For example: Battery research was funded by market driven improvements to laptops for decades before they got 'good enough' to power an electric car. Once a technology has an actual market pushing it forward, government research money can be better spent on more fundamental research elsewhere.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[AlphaWolf_HK]

Or to be more precisely, how alternative goods/resources work.

If you take away 37% of the supply of electricity, it will need to be replaced. This means that alternatives to coal will go up in price, and your electricity costs will go up with them. These hipsters might talk all day about saving the rainforest, but in reality they'll never go a day without their ipads and a working espresso machine.

That would actually be a great opportunity for nuclear, however I have a feeling that these guys would hate nuclear even more than coal (I know it's stereotyping, but their type usually does and you'd be hard pressed to argue otherwise.)

Kind of a side rant, but I'm not sure what the ultimate purpose of preventing man-made global warming is supposed to be. The best argument I've heard is to prevent the loss of landmass to rising sea water, but that's already going to happen anyways (less than 100k years ago Los Angeles was under water, and no matter what we do it will one day again be under water.) Higher global temperatures have historically resulted in more arable land rather than simple increased droughts. If you want more physical landmass, then you'll need to drop the climate to ice age levels where biodiversity actually tends to suffer. During the age of dinosaurs, the carbon dioxidie PPM was 18 times higher than it is now, biodiversity was at one of its peaks, the overall climate was 8C warmer, and plantlife was more abundant than ever. In other words, history has shown that a warmer planet is literally a more green one.

So what kind of disaster is anti-climate change supposed to avert again?

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[JDS13]

> when it comes to talk about cutting these subsidies, the "big oil" boyz are all against it.

I don't know what "subsidies" you're referring to. I've never seen this in any formal statement from a major oil company. Exxon remains one of the world's biggest taxpayers, with an effective tax rate of 46% of gross margin. In 2013, they paid $30.6 billion in sales-based taxes, $33.2 billion in other taxes, and $24.3 billion in income taxes. (That is, those taxes were included in the price of Exxon's products.)

But the fact is that no business really pays taxes. They're passed along to customers in higher prices, to shareholders in reduced returns, to employees in lower wages. The net effect is a reduction in wealth for all three constituencies.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Pino Grigio]

What's more depressing is that these stories make it onto slashdot. The stupid in the environmental movement is painful to consider.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[gurps_npc]

While it is true that theoretically scientifically, we have clean coal technologies available, Coal is still the dirtiest and worst of the power technologies.

This is because of two reasons. 1) Truly clean coal technologies are expensive - more expensive than solar powered or wind power. So practically nobody uses it. and

2) Coal companies - more than any other power industry - have found ways to avoid complying with regulations. Specifically, they campaigned hard to allow existing plants to go unregulated until after they 'modernized' in the normal course of time. Then they refused to modernize - for the past 60 years.

Tuna fish is one of the healthiest cheap foods you can eat - or rather would be EXCEPT for the mercury in it which comes from coal. Coal burning plants are more radioactive than nuclear power plants because small bits of thorium are in coal and when you burn it, it gets wafted up into the air and settles around the coal plant. Not to mention the acid rain and the green house gas issues.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[JoeMerchant]

The article is ignorant of how basic economics work.

The AC is ignorant of what was written in the article.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[icebike]

Storage is actually under-rated.

The other problems of creating a grid sufficient to meet country wide needs are also underrated.

Indeed, these problems are virtually hand-waived away by most, with the blithe assertion that the sun is shining and the wind is blowing somewhere. These folks never look at maps, and fail to notice that the earth is 3/4 covered with oceans.

Hydro works because of storage. Coal works because of storage. Nuclear works because of storage. You can spool these up when needed, and throttle them back when not needed, storing the fuel for later.

Wind and solar have a big problem, not because of grid technology, but simply because of lack of storage.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[JoeMerchant]

The article is a summary of a larger proposal. Even in the article, they state that power generation will be transitioned to other fuels / sources, workers retrained, etc.

Even if the larger proposal is less than perfect, it is examining relative costs and benefits of keeping vs. shutting down the coal industry. From their perspective, every dollar spent in closing down the coal industry will be paid back 2-3x in reduced costs like pollution, healthcare, etc. even after accounting for the increased cost of electricity and other items.

TL;DR: coal costs us more to keep than to get rid of.

Remember lead in paint and gasoline? Accurately accounting for the social/economic benefits of the lead phase out is impossible, but overall it is becoming quite clear that the lead phase-out was a win. Same for asbestos, CFCs and PCBs. For me, the jury is still out over removing arsenic from treated wood, but I think I can agree with their forecasting on coal. As for smaller scale uses of coal, those could continue, and yes, prices might rise in the short term, but actually, those industries would benefit in the longer term due to the reduced demand for coal for power, and therefore longer lifetime of the non-renewable resource.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Charliemopps]

The coal mines don't own the coal. The states do. The mines buy permits to mine it. As soon as one mine is gone, that permit is open for whomever wants to show up and take over.

What are all the families that heat their homes with coal going to do? Are you going to buy them all new furnaces and pipe natural gas up the mountain to them? Oh, but natural gas isn't green is it? So you're going to install solar panels on their land? where does it end?

Lastly, do you think Virginia is going to allow this at all? Shuttering their biggest industry? Not a chance in hell.

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[danbert8]

Don't handle change well? Umm what kind of time scale are we talking about here? Human populations, especially in urban concentrations are very mobile. The vast majority of major cities have popped up from small towns over the course of 100 years or less.
http://hongwrong.com/hong-kong...

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[Kilo Kilo]

The article is a summary of a larger proposal. Even in the article, they state that power generation will be transitioned to other fuels / sources, workers retrained, etc.

There's no mention of how they plan on doing this.

What are you going to retrain the workers to do? How are you going to "create job opportunities and prosperity for coal-based communities" ? There's nothing substantial in this article. These people think that they can replace coal overnight with unicorn farts and sunshine.

The coal industry is bad for the environment. Yeah, we get it. However, it's a major part of the economy and one of the leading producers of electricity. While trying to transition from coal is a noble intent, there's nothing of value in this article. There isn't any plan, there isn't even a good premise.

The article starts by saying "Would you make a one time $50 (£31) investment to save $100-500 each year?" Then it goes on to talk about the "benefits" that buying out the coal industry has. This isn't a good comparison. If I make an investment, I want a return on that investment, not some intangible benefits. If I want intangible benefits like a warm fuzzy feeling, it's called charity. Now, there's nothing wrong with charity, but TFA starts out talking about investments so now they're just misleading the reader.

They go on to talk about coal's "dark future" and how it's a "dead end industry." Ok, so let it die. There's no need to blow $50B on a "dead end industry."

Re:This is more than a little bit naive.

[russotto]

When I think about the "dark future" of coal, I'm thinking about strip mines that dig into historic towns in Germany (oh, boo hoo, relocate the church and everyone get on with life, right?)

Pretty much.

To me, that's the whole problem with massive industry built on non-renewable resources. When the coal is just lying around on the surface of the desert, sure, pick it up and use it. But, that runs out - then we start digging for it in places that don't really matter, but those run out, and then we get a little closer to towns, streams that feed recreational lakes, and other places that you might rather not mine, but, hey, we need the coal, right?

You like electricity? How about heat? Air conditioning? Rapid transportation? How about food?

All of those things depend largely on "non-renewable resources". Coal, oil, and natural gas, mainly. Shut it all down, and we go back to a life primitive, brutish, and short.

Errr, no.

[blackicye]

This would never fly. The last 10% of the coal mines would just be laughing their way to the bank with this unexpected windfall.

Re:Errr, no.

[Anonymous Coward]

Right - because no one could possibly think of going back to get that coal once the companies were shut down. And of course we burn coal "just because" - its not like we *did* anything with coal that was useful. I'm sure that all the rest of our industry/economy that benefited from the coal use would just ...um .... uh ...

Oh, right. We could collapse without something to replace coal - which we currently do not have - I don't think their $50 billion covers that little problem...

Wanting to solve environmental problems is great and I encourage people to do so. However, any "solution" which refuses to acknowledge and address the reasons why the practice/industry/whatever was started is not a "solution" at all because it will never work.

opposite of brilliant

[brainspank]

imagine their sad faces when they realize that's what charges their electric cars.

Re:opposite of brilliant

[i kan reed]

You understand the point of electric cars is to enable the changeover from fossil fuels at a systemic level, right? The car doesn't care where the energy is coming from, allowing a regulatory framework to change as pragmatic options become available.

(My area's electricity is about 50% nuclear, 15% renewable)

Replaced by what?

[lgw]

This plan doesn't fund replacing the power from those plants with anything, just some hand waving about "renewable energy" being expanded in parallel. Cheap energy matters. The cost of everything we buy, everything we use, comes down to labor and energy costs. If you make energy more expensive everyone pays, and pays in a "regressive" way like a sales tax.

It might still makes sense, maybe, but it will take more than hand waving.

Re:Replaced by what?

[Obfuscant]

You are an complete idiot with your france/frensh analogy.

Didn't mention creme frensh. Just runny stinky cheese.

and stayin in your kitschen and living room

I keep all my kitsch in my living room, so I suppose you could say my kitschen is my living room.

and puttin a gun at your daughters and wifes head?

"Puttin" has nothing to do with France or the USA, he's busy putting a gun to the heads of Crimea and Ukraine.

But well, considering your cheese comment you perhaps only try to make a very very sarcastic comment ... who knows.

I think most people can hear that wooshing sound you've missed out on.

That's nice, however:

[kheldan]

The U.S. is just one country. Many other countries (China, for instance) are still using coal, and I think will more or less say the same thing: That's nice. We'll keep using coal. Want to be real heroes of the environment? Raise enough money to buy out the coal industry all over the world.

Re:That's nice, however:

[Tom]

No, by starting something good, you can still lead the way.

For example, yes, build a Thorium reactor. If it happens to be cheaper than coal, and you don't put silly export controls on it, India and China might just go with that instead of coal. China, meanwhile, is also deploying massive amounts of solar as we speak, because Europe and the US lead the way, did the research and then outsourced production to... China.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[DNS-and-BIND]

Are you still dancing on that woman's grave? Jeez, conservatives didn't celebrate this much when Joseph Freaking Stalin died.

Didn't Hate Week sate your hatred? You know, the week after she died when you had hate parades to show just how much you hated her. No, seriously, this really happened. Hate parades.

Better uses for $50 billion

[MobyDisk]

You have $50 billion to spend on green energy. Make your choice:
1) Give the $50 billion to coal executives and shareholders who will then use that money to create new coal companies and open new mines, since you have done nothing to eliminate with the demand.
2) Build $50 billion worth of green energy to put the coal companies out of business for good.

The entire article is illogical. You can't just eliminate the laws of supply and demand.

Re:Better uses for $50 billion

[Rob Y.]

I would assume that this idea falls under the category of 'thought experiment'. The point being to highlight that the coal industry accounts for 'only' 50 billion dollars worth of assets, which is a smaller portion of our economy and total assets than the hysteria of 'anything you do to attempt to phase out coal will destroy America' would suggest.

Now if the country could shift to renewables for a mere 50 billion it might well be worth it. Of course, as others have pointed out, buying up all the coal plants won't accomplish that.

Contracts

[sycodon]

No mention either of contractual obligations to municipalities or business like large manufacturing plants, etc. Lawyers are salivating over this idea.

What to replace coal with?

[SYSS Mouse]

I assume the proposal just assume coal industry to produce electricity, but there is more than that, The iron industry and steelmaking industry also uses coal.

Re:What to replace coal with?

[brufar]

I converted my home to heat with Coal this year, as I can no longer afford the ridiculous cost of heating oil.

Cost to Heat Last season with heating Oil -- $2,200.00 (675 Gallons of Oil)
Cost to Heat this season after converting to Coal $660.00 (3 Tons of Coal)

Tried a pellet stove last year, it barely put out enough BTU's to heat one room in the house. That was a $3200.00 boondoggle, took a huge loss reselling the thing.

Don't mention geoThermal as the incredibly high cost of installation, plus the necessary Electrical service upgrade to support the electric booster furnace for this region, makes it unaffordable to install in an older home, like most other 'green' solutions.

Until someone finds a cost effective, affordable solution to replace these, Coal will remain king in my home.

What about buying out the Chinese polluters?

[PseudoCoder]

Because they make US look like amateurs.

Supply and demand.

[HornWumpus]

As the supply of cheap power is decreased the value of the remaining generation will increase. The value of a power plant if the present value of future profits. Remove coal from the supply and power prices go up. That makes the remaining coal plants worth much more.

25 billion might get you the first half. 50 billion will never get it all.

Where does the rest come from?

[HockeyPuck]

According to the US Energy Administration...

  In 2012, the United States generated about 4,054 billion kilowatthours of electricity. About 68% of the electricity generated was from fossil fuel (coal, natural gas, and petroleum), with 37% attributed from coal.

Energy sources and percent share of total electricity generation in 2012 were:

        Coal 37%
        Natural Gas 30%
        Nuclear 19%
        Hydropower 7%
        Other Renewable 5%
                Biomass 1.42%
                Geothermal 0.41%
                Solar 0.11%
                Wind 3.46%
        Petroleum 1%
        Other Gases 1%

Re:Where does the rest come from?

[CanHasDIY]

How do those figures break down geographically? Because there are some places in America where millions of people rely 100% on coal for electricity generation.

Re:Where does the rest come from?

[coolsnowmen]

+1 for peaking my curiosity.

I found this: http://www.eia.gov/state/maps.... [which is surprisingly decent]

Not nearly enough money

[icebike]

In addition you have to replace a whole bunch of brand new highly efficient and scrubbed power stations, and totally shut down steel production.
Metallurgic coal (coke) is essential for steel production. That pushes steel production to other countries, causing a world wide shortage, and we end up paying more and they end up polluting more.

Coal gasification projects, current and planned, would all be wiped out exactly when they are needed.

You can't simply look at the market cap of coal industry companies on Yahoo and sum them all up.
Like most plans, this is a simplistic and simple minded approach. It would never work

Retraining

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole "retrain" workers gets me.

Retrain them for what?

Let's assume that all of those workers have the talent to be retrained in any field. What would that be?

Are the billionaires also going to pay those folks to move to areas of the country that have other industries besides coal? Would the billionaires start other industries in coal country to absorb the workers?

Retraining is just a fantasy for policy makers. Folks get retrained and find that they still can't get a job. Part of the reason is that the labor market is still really tight and employers are not willing to hire entry level people because they don't have to. There are plenty of experienced people looking.

Anyway this "article" is nothing but a "what if" by the author; so it's not to be taken seriously.-+

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[AGMW]

Obviously carefully stepping over the fact that the previous labour government (Callaghan was it?) shut more mines than Thatcher because, and here's the kicker, they were uneconomic! It cost more to dig up the coal than the coal was worth, and we could get coal cheaper from elsewhere, including the damn shipping costs! ... no really!

Had Scargill not tried to bring down the elected government by flexing the miner's muscle maybe the scenes of violence could have been avoided, but I'll grant you that anywhere the Met (London Police) got brought in it turned nasty, but that's more a reflection of the Met than Thatcher - the Met are _still_ a little too handy with their fists (see Ian Tomlinson)

Re:Why not massively subsidize the Solar Industry?

[PlusFiveTroll]

Panels, panels are useless. Batteries and power storage is the question. Not very many is the answer.

50 billion

[thoth]

They should try Kickstarter!

Re: This is what Thatcher was good at

[ackthpt]

Sounds complicated. Just burn them and their customers with excessive taxes.

And use those taxes to put the miners on welfare.

Yuh.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it's okay to hate thatcher, if you're British. She did terrible fucking things to her own country in pursuit of an unworkable ideology. It'd be okay to hate Stalin this much if you lived under him.

You have no idea just how stupid you sound. If you can compare Thatcher to Stalin... you have to be an idiot or totally ignorant. Not liking her policies or ideology is one thing, comparing her to one of the greatest mass murderers in history is another. Grow up. It may be the internet but it has enough ignorance without this.

Re:umm no

[jandrese]

Especially when you live in an area where everybody just lost their job. Southern West Virginia is depressed enough already without all of the coal mines shutting down at basically the same time.

Get real

[Anonymous Coward]

What are you going to do with the ~37% loss in energy production?

This would take decades to phase out and far more than 50 billion dollars.

Click bait

Dual Fuel: Green != Liberal

[Anonymous Coward]

I have an uncle that is an ex-GE now consulting engineer in the coal power plant industry.

Many power plants are dual fuel: coal or NG. They run whatever is cheaper. And the thing is, at least with modern equipment coal burns as clean as Natural Gas. It even scrubs the metals out of the emissions: no mercury being emitted - or at least 99% of it.

Coal gets a bad rap because of its history and China - they're using 19th Century technology.

You know, General Electric is doing some great things with fossil fuels AND "Green" energy. It royally pisses me off when I hear "Green" energy (solar, wind, geothermal, hydro) labeled as "Liberal" when in fact it's the MOST capitalistic industry out there.

If anyone calls "Green" energy a "liberal" cause, they are just expressing their ignorance.

Easier Still: Reform General Mining Act of 1872

[retroworks]

The 1872 GMA law, signed by Ulysses S. Grant to hasten western development during the Apache Indian Wars, gives mining companies 1) right to lease rather than buy the land, at about $5 per acre, 2) no responsibility for remediation and pollution cost, and 3) no obligation to pay taxpayers any royalty on what's mined from the Federal Land. After 137 Years, it was nearly (finally!) updated in 2009, but candidate Barack Obama cut a deal with Nevada Senator (D) Harry Reid.

As for coal, according to Bureau of Land Management "BLM has responsibility for coal leasing on approximately 570 million acres where the coal mineral estate is owned by the Federal Government. The surface estate of these lands could be controlled by BLM, the United States Forest Service, private land owners, state land owners, or other Federal agencies. BLM receives revenues on coal leasing at three points: 1) a bonus paid at the time BLM issues the lease an annual rental payment of $3.00 per acre or fraction thereof, 2) royalties paid on the value of the coal after it has been mined. The Department of the Interior and the state where the coal was mined share the revenues." News Flash: The total fees collected do not even cover the costs of staff at the Interior Department or BLM!

Most of the mining done on the federal lands is hard rock mining (copper, gold, silver, etc.) but that is also the highest source or carbon and toxics (47% of all toxics released by all USA industry). It bankrupted Superfund (14 of the 15 largest sites are metal mining on federal land). The mere suggestion in 2009 that the GMA might be reformed caused stock in recycling companies to go up, and commodity hedge funds to go up.

I was in the Peabody coal IPO

[WillAffleckUW]

Quite frankly, you're wasting your time.

Most of the owners of coal stocks intend to hold it.

You'd be better off investing in more efficient coal-burning plants that cause less waste and less pollution, including GHG emissions, from the same unit of coal.

You're also missing that a lot of the country is national and state parks and federal lands (like military) which are forced to lease lands with coal at insanely low rates for mining.

Fix those things. Your money will go farther.

(personally, my carbon impact is about 1/10th of most Americans, so Do More, Whine Less)

Chump Change

[MadMartigan2001]

The Federal Reserve spends 85 billion a **MONTH** on quantitative easing. Yet 50 billion will buy out the entire coal industry of the United States? Something is wrong there.

Won't change anything... except

[hAckz0r]

Except raise the prices of electricity. The Coal plants will just import form overseas and the proce to consumers will be higher as a result. Not that raising the price won't change the economics, but it won't kill the industry like they seem to assume here. It would be better to pour their money into some R&D to find a better substitute with a lower cost green alternative. After all $50 Billion with a 'B' would certainly help find better technology if in the right hands.

Re:Won't change anything... except

[Mr. Esterhouse]

It will triple prices of elctricity, at least. What's going to cover what's left over, wind, nuclear, solar??? It time sure but not right now. They could convert coal plants over to natural gas but then you'll have the fracking nuts complain and try and do the same thing. hAck0r is right, they could use that $50 billion towards research and provide better solutions.

Kramer and Friend don't have $50 billion

[Oligonicella]

As always, these plans call on **other people's** money to do what their little hearts desire. And note, one suggestion was government funding. You know, taking money from people who are against their idea to fund it. As always.

Sowhere will the electricity come from?

[sandbagger]

I guess we'll be building a lot more nuclear power plants, then?

Re:Sowhere will the electricity come from?

[Tom]

I guess we'll be building a lot more nuclear power plants, then?

I, for one, maintain that a mix of renewable and nuclear power is the future. Coal really is the absolute worst thing you could do. Its environmental impact is crazy, a coal plant actually leaks more radiation than a nuclear plant, and depending on how you get the coal, the impact on the landscape and lives of people nearby can be utterly insane.

This is the realty of coal:
http://www.gegenstrom13.de/wp-...
http://www.allmystery.de/i/tf6...

Some of these are so large, they are clearly visible on satellite images:
http://www.spiegel.de/wissensc...

The worst part is that their land use in general directly compete with forests, which means their CO2 impact is even higher, because forests are great in storing CO2.

Sorry, anyone who in 2014 seriously contemplates burning coal is a freaking lunatic who should be locked up and receive therapy.

Re:How do we fill the energy gap?

[RatherBeAnonymous]

Sure, we would have fewer premature deaths from respiratory illnesses, but that would mean more non-working octogenarians and nonagenarians. Studies out of Europe have shown that keeping people smoking and obese is much more economically viable because they tend to be productive up until retirement, or near-retirement, age, then die of a short illness. "Healthy" people, on the other hand, live a long time, fighting off repeated illnesses for a decade or two after retirement. Eliminating coal would probably have a similar effect.

http://daveatherton.wordpress....

I am playing devil's advocate here. I don't believe we should keep coal just to kill off retirees. After-all, I plan to be one someday.

Re: $50 billion seems quite cheap

[CaptainLard]

Interesting subject but your post ends up a bit obvious and redundant given all the other posts (no offense, constructive criticism!) while ignoring the truly surprising part of this plan. The entire coal industry can be bought for ONLY $50B?! There are individuals walking around with more money than that. Exxon's profits for 2013 alone were over $30B. How is an entire 100+ year old industry that supplies 40% of our power and holds political sway over a bunch of states only worth $50 billion?

Re:Why not massively subsidize the Solar Industry?

[DaveV1.0]

New York City is one of the most electrically efficient places in the U.S. It would take 85 square miles of solar panels to power NYC assuming 4 hours of bright direct sunlight per day, every day of the year on each panel. The area under those 85 square miles will be, at best, in permanent shadow. Where are you going to put the panels so that they receive such good sunshine? What will the environmental effects be? How will you keep snow, ice, dust, dirt, bird shit, etc. off them? How will you prevent vandalization?

Retraining Won't Be Enough for Unemployed Miners

[Koreantoast]

I'm REALLY curious as to what they expect to replace the coal mining business with in the middle of rural West Virginia. Even assuming you could retrain all those workers, that simply leaves an entire army of now skilled workers sitting in towns that have had their economy completely decimated by the elimination of coal. One doesn't simply regenerate a brand new, magic economy there from scratch. Even something as basic as building a new factory, say a solar panel factory, would require not just the cost of building the factory, but the infrastructure to support said factory (roads, water, power, rail links, etc.), and $50B is not going to cover the cost of doing that for 87,000 workers.

Re:Easier Still: Reform General Mining Act of 1872

[NoImNotNineVolt]

According to Wikipedia:

"The mining law applies to some mineral products, but not others, and the list has changed over time. Since 1920, the list of locatable minerals does not include petroleum, coal, phosphate, sodium, and potassium. Rights to explore for and extract these are leased through competitive bidding." (Emphasis mine)

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[Pino Grigio]

Actually, the Labour governments before her shut down more mines than she ever did; a considerable number more. But don't let the facts spoil a good fantasy. If anything destroyed the miners it was union militancy; the useful idiots of the left who allied themselves with Soviet Russia.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[Pino Grigio]

What a moronic comment. Her `unworkable ideology' has been the centre ground of British politics since around 1986. Even the Labour party dropped it's idiotic "ownership of the means of production" rubbish under Blair and nobody on the left, apart from the usual loons, are arguing to bring it back.

If you want to see what a post neo-liberal political ideology looks like, go to a shop in Venezuela.

Re:What about the rail unions who may stop this

[DaveAtFraud]

Most remaining coal plants are, more or less, at the mine. The energy is 'shipped' down a transmission line.

Bzzzzzzzzttttttttt Wrong.

From a CSX press release today (13 March 2014):

"The company said the reduced operations will be partly offset by higher demand for coal to warm homes and businesses, as it carried "several million new tons of domestic coal" during the quarter."

Other railroads such as Norfolk Southern, Union Pacific and BNSF have all said about the same thing. There is an engineering tradeoff between transportation costs of coal (surprisingly cheap) and transmission losses. The solution seems to be to ship the coal to someplace relatively close to where the power will be needed.

Cheers,
Dave

Kill coal, sure. Give them free money, NO!

[SvnLyrBrto]

I agree pretty much wholeheartedly that the coal companies need to die. But a 50-billion dollar payoff to an industry that is proud to poison the skies, destroy the landscape, and ruin the drinking water? Give free money to the people who want the USâ(TM)s environment to become more like Chinaâ(TM)s? Oh, HELL no. Put them out of business by any other means necessary. But letâ(TM)s not give those bastards a single red cent. Seriously. Screw those guys.

A better idea would be to impose (and enforce) strict carbon and particulate caps, deny permits for strip, open-pit, and mountaintop-removal mining, and crippling penalties for release of mining and processing chemical waste into the water supply. And you know what? If the coal companies are willing to reform themselves to operate within those constraint as good corporate citizens, fine. I will reform my opinion of them if and when they do. But otherwise? Screw âem.

And if weâ(TM)re going to spend 50-billion dollars on getting the US off of coal, letâ(TM)s do it the right way and use it to fund R&D on alternate, cleaner, energy sources: efficient photovoltaics, energy-positive fusion, thorium or fast-breeder fission, and so on.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[i kan reed]

I'm not going to take advice from someone who uses the term "neoliberal" to mean its literal opposite.

Re:Easier Still: Reform General Mining Act of 1872

[retroworks]

The source of the parent quote above is the Bureau of Land Management federal website. Perhaps whoever authored your wikipedia article is making a distinction about the "Mineral Leasing Act of 1920" which is derivative of the GMA. Or perhaps Jack Abramoff's mignons have been editing your wiki. But again, this is from BLM.gov

http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/prog/energy/coal_and_non-energy.html "BLM has responsibility for coal leasing on approximately 570 million acres where the coal mineral estate is owned by the Federal Government. The surface estate of these lands could be controlled by BLM, the United States Forest Service, private land owners, state land owners, or other Federal agencies. BLM receives revenues on coal leasing at three points: 1) a bonus paid at the time BLM issues the lease an annual rental payment of $3.00 per acre or fraction thereof, 2) royalties paid on the value of the coal after it has been mined. The Department of the Interior and the state where the coal was mined share the revenues."

Again, the total fees collected (GMA 1872 and MLA 1920 combined) do not even cover the costs of staff at the Interior Department or BLM!

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[DaveAtFraud]

Are you still dancing on that woman's grave? Jeez, conservatives didn't celebrate this much when Joseph Freaking Stalin died.

Didn't Hate Week sate your hatred? You know, the week after she died when you had hate parades to show just how much you hated her. No, seriously, this really happened. Hate parades.

Liberals hate conservatives but they REALLY hate conservatives like Thatcher and Reagan who got it right. Conservatives like Bush Jr. and Palin are easy targets and ad hominem attacks that discredit the person rather than the ideas. Thatcher and Reagan put their ideas into operation and both countries benefited. That's what really pisses off the liberals. They'd rather have the country going down a rat hole the way GB was under Labour governments than admit a conservative like Thatcher was right.

Cheers,
Dave

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[i kan reed]

Oh, I see, you meant to imply the entire world is either neo-liberal or like Venezula. That's so stupid a parsing of your statement it didn't even occur to me.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[i kan reed]

"Enjoy the benefits of some economic liberalism"!="being neoliberal". You can shut down idiots who are anti-union, pro-corporate psuedofascists, without saying "hey competition on price and private ownership of capital are bad". If one scrolls to the bottom of the article there, you can see that list of criticisms? Every one of those is pretty damned important.

Race-to-the-bottom and casualization of labor are both particularly important problems that lay unaddressed, other than "in theory".

How about insulation and whatnot?

[PeterM from Berkeley]

Just curious, if you improved the insulation on your house, how much would that save you, potentially? Did you try that and how well did it work?

I think I invested a couple thousand on insulation for my roof and it cut my winter heating and summer cooling by 30% and the whole house just *feels* more comfortable. I think I made the investment back in two years--heating done with natural gas, cooling done with electricity.

--PeterM

Re:What about the rail unions who may stop this

[DaveAtFraud]

And how many "modern" coal fired plants are being built? Not many due to pollution limits. On the other hand, there are lots of old coal fired plants that were located close to population centers. I usually pass a couple of coal trains each day hauling Wyoming coal down to Colorado Springs (where I work) and points south like Pueblo and on into New Mexico. Quite a few only make it as far as Denver. Not many power plants up near the mines in Wyoming (also not many people).

Another funny thing about that. Recently had a local political flap about plans to build some new high tension transmission lines where there hadn't been any before. You should have heard the outcry against building "ugly power lines". Nobody seems to notice a couple more coal trains on the same tracks though.

Other point... That's "several million new tons of domestic coal". You apparently missed the "new". Can't find a number for how much domestic coal they haul but they ship about 30 to 35 million tons a year for export. Just one railroad.

Cheers,
Dave

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[GameboyRMH]

"Got it right?" Both created some temporary, unsustainable benefit but left disastrous consequences that we're still experiencing today. They're the people who cooked the goose that laid the golden eggs, and you're saying "Mmm mmm that goose sure was tasty! Cooking it was the right thing to do!"

No, Thatcher and Reagan got it the most wrong of all. Not as wrong as Mao, but incredibly wrong by Western standards.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[DaveAtFraud]

No, Thatcher and Reagan got it the most wrong of all. Not as wrong as Mao, but incredibly wrong by liberal standards.

Fixed that for you. You seem to assume that your liberal leanings are Western standards. Not.

Cheers,
Dave

Re: This is what Thatcher was good at

[Anonymous Coward]

Those European conservatives are left wing in the US.

Liberals hate conservatives?

[TapeCutter]

admit a conservative like Thatcher was right.

I've been a "left wing greenie" since the 70's, my 80yo parents are both life long "war baby" conservatives who grew up under Winston Chuchill, I love my elderly parents, I don't agree with everything they say but that doesn't make me hate them? I'm also old enough to clearly remember the 70's and 80's and I think you are correct, Thatcher deserves credit for pulling the UK out of a bad financial position, even though her methods polarized the political landscape. It should also be noted that "trickle down economics" has also ultimately been discredited by the recent GFC but you can hardly blame Thatcher and Reagan for the extremes of deregulation implemented by others that followed their tenure. For example, here in Oz it was the left wing treasurer and later PM (Paul Keating) who pushed for deregulating the banks.

Having said that, Thatcher, Reagan and Malcom Fraser (Australia's late 70's, conservative PM) were not even the same species as GWB, Palin, and Tony Abbot (current Oz PM). For example Thatcher was the first world leader to publically acknowledge AGW is a problem and Reagan personally sought and obtained an international cap and trade treaty on sulphur emissions that has been very successful in curbing acid rain. I suspect Reagan was taking his cues from Thatcher on the acid rain thing since she had read chemistry at Oxford before becoming involved in politics. Fraser's "radical" policy on refugees was closer to today's green party policy than it is to either of the majors who currently are so close to each other that the only meaningful debate on the subject is which third world nation should host our immigration gulags..
Hate parades Aside from the fact that ALL leaders make good and bad decisions, celebrating the death of anyone pretty much makes you a douchebag in my opinion. Headlines such as "Ding, dong, the witch is dead" were a low point even by the UK's notoriously low tabloid "standards". Far right conservatives flying an upside down flag after Obama's election were equally obscene.

Liberals hate conservatives

The real problem is human nature, ideas and long term results are simply ignored because people pigeon hole others by whatever political colour they wear on the outside. This stereotyping separates people into political "football teams" and you're not suppose to just enjoy a game of football, society expects you to be a one-eyed supporter of a particular team. GWB summed up that attitude succinctly with the infamous words addressed to the entire planet - "You're either with us or against us". That anti-human attitude, wherever it raises it's ugly head, is what I "hate" about politics.

Disclaimer: I don't claim to be anymore immune to the tribal nature of humans than anyone else on the planet, however just being aware of it's existence does make one stop and think every now and then.

Re:This is what Thatcher was good at

[Goody]

Reagan got it right? Remember Trickle Down Economics? Middle class wages have been stagnant ever since and we continue to struggle with deficits partly due to Reagan's "right" policies. Something has been trickling down, but it's not wealth and prosperity.

Re:Retraining Won't Be Enough for Unemployed Miner

[Tom]

Because people being out of jobs is the really important thing when you have to decide between fucking up the planet or not fucking up the planet, yes?

Funny how /. has multiple personalities. When it comes to the MPAA and RIAA, we keep telling them that analogy with the car replacing the horse carriage and to move with the times.