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Good, leave it in the ground where it belongs. Here in the US coal plant closures are more due to the rise of natural gas plants rather than renewables, but ev

Good, leave it in the ground where it belongs. Here in the US coal plant closures are more due to the rise of natural gas plants rather than renewables, but even natural gas only has half the carbon emissions and doesn't produce toxic coal ash.

jpollock 7y ago
American coal won't stay in the ground any more than Australia's does. There are plenty of coal burning power plants in the world, and while it may not be economic to burn it for electricity in the US, there are countries which import a lot of coal. https://www.worldcoal.org/coal/coal-market-pricing https://www.worldcoal.org/coal/coal-market-pricing
- Brakenshire 7y ago
  We have many hundreds of years of reserves, coal will certainly cease as a source of electricity before the reserves are used up. Many of those reserves are held as assets on the books of multinational coal mining companies. Just look at the stock prices for those companies and the rolling process of bankruptcies to see the market judgment of the value of those assets, and the demand for coal in the immediate future.
- duxup 7y ago
  American coal mining companies seem to be cutting back or shutting down as it is. I'm not sure what the long term outlook is for them.
- zrobotics 7y ago
  Speaking as someone who has recently driven through the powder river basin in WY, there is definitely coal that is staying in the ground. Mining co's are going bankrupt, and are cutting jobs and production; this is a severe enough reduction that the BNSF railway is also suffering in the area due to decreased tonnage exported.
- pastor_elm 7y ago
  Environmentalists should buy the coal, artificially inflate the price, and store it permanently so it never gets burned.
  - esarbe 7y ago
    That would just increase demand, raising prices only until the coal mining companies caught up with their production. No, the only solution is to get away from coal consumption.
- Causality1 7y ago
  Even so, and I may be a selfish bastard for saying it, but I'd rather they poison their rivers and groundwater with containment pool breaches and toxic runoff than we poison ours.
janj 7y ago
Natural gas might not be much of an improvement. A leak rate of greater than 3% could potentially be more destructive to the green house effect than burning coal. http://theconversation.com/the-us-natural-gas-industry-is-leaking-way-more-methane-than-previously-thought-heres-why-that-matters-98918 http://theconversation.com/the-us-natural-gas-industry-is-le...
- space_fountain 7y ago
  It falls put of the atmosphere a lot faster than CO2 though right?
  - janj 7y ago
    I believe that is right. I'd recommend Falter, it covers a lot of ground, including this piece. https://www.amazon.com/Falter-Human-Game-Begun-Itself/dp/1250178266 https://www.amazon.com/Falter-Human-Game-Begun-Itself/dp/125...
  - mac01021 7y ago
    It actually decays into CO2 in the atmosphere and then that CO2 remains there for the normal period of time.
  - Symmetry 7y ago
    Yeah, the half life is somewhere between 10 to 15 years.
  - opo 7y ago
    For the first 2 decades or so, methane is about 86 times worse than CO2: >While CO2 persists in the atmosphere for centuries, or even millennia, methane warms the planet on steroids for a decade or two before decaying to CO2. >In those short decades, methane warms the planet by 86 times as much as CO2, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. >But policymakers typically ignore methane's warming potential over 20 years (GWP20) when assembling a nation's emissions inventory. Instead, they stretch out methane's warming impacts over a century, which makes the gas appear more benign than it is, experts said. The 100-year warming potential (GWP100) of methane is 34, according to the IPCC. >There is no scientific reason to prefer a 100-year time horizon over a 20-year time horizon; the choice of GWP100 is simply a matter of convention. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-greenhouse-gas-is-methane/?redirect=1 https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-gree...

jpollock 7y ago

American coal won't stay in the ground any more than Australia's does. There are plenty of coal burning power plants in the world, and while it may not be economic to burn it for electricity in the US, there are countries which import a lot of coal. https://www.worldcoal.org/coal/coal-market-pricing https://www.worldcoal.org/coal/coal-market-pricing

Brakenshire 7y ago
We have many hundreds of years of reserves, coal will certainly cease as a source of electricity before the reserves are used up. Many of those reserves are held as assets on the books of multinational coal mining companies. Just look at the stock prices for those companies and the rolling process of bankruptcies to see the market judgment of the value of those assets, and the demand for coal in the immediate future.
duxup 7y ago
American coal mining companies seem to be cutting back or shutting down as it is. I'm not sure what the long term outlook is for them.
zrobotics 7y ago
Speaking as someone who has recently driven through the powder river basin in WY, there is definitely coal that is staying in the ground. Mining co's are going bankrupt, and are cutting jobs and production; this is a severe enough reduction that the BNSF railway is also suffering in the area due to decreased tonnage exported.
pastor_elm 7y ago
Environmentalists should buy the coal, artificially inflate the price, and store it permanently so it never gets burned.
- esarbe 7y ago
  That would just increase demand, raising prices only until the coal mining companies caught up with their production. No, the only solution is to get away from coal consumption.
Causality1 7y ago
Even so, and I may be a selfish bastard for saying it, but I'd rather they poison their rivers and groundwater with containment pool breaches and toxic runoff than we poison ours.

janj 7y ago

Natural gas might not be much of an improvement. A leak rate of greater than 3% could potentially be more destructive to the green house effect than burning coal. http://theconversation.com/the-us-natural-gas-industry-is-leaking-way-more-methane-than-previously-thought-heres-why-that-matters-98918 http://theconversation.com/the-us-natural-gas-industry-is-le...

space_fountain 7y ago
It falls put of the atmosphere a lot faster than CO2 though right?
- janj 7y ago
  I believe that is right. I'd recommend Falter, it covers a lot of ground, including this piece. https://www.amazon.com/Falter-Human-Game-Begun-Itself/dp/1250178266 https://www.amazon.com/Falter-Human-Game-Begun-Itself/dp/125...
- mac01021 7y ago
  It actually decays into CO2 in the atmosphere and then that CO2 remains there for the normal period of time.
- Symmetry 7y ago
  Yeah, the half life is somewhere between 10 to 15 years.
- opo 7y ago
  For the first 2 decades or so, methane is about 86 times worse than CO2: >While CO2 persists in the atmosphere for centuries, or even millennia, methane warms the planet on steroids for a decade or two before decaying to CO2. >In those short decades, methane warms the planet by 86 times as much as CO2, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. >But policymakers typically ignore methane's warming potential over 20 years (GWP20) when assembling a nation's emissions inventory. Instead, they stretch out methane's warming impacts over a century, which makes the gas appear more benign than it is, experts said. The 100-year warming potential (GWP100) of methane is 34, according to the IPCC. >There is no scientific reason to prefer a 100-year time horizon over a 20-year time horizon; the choice of GWP100 is simply a matter of convention. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-greenhouse-gas-is-methane/?redirect=1 https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-bad-of-a-gree...