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> Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has ties to the coal industry, and he told CNN he won't vote for the package. He argues utilities already are mov

> Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has ties to the coal industry, and he told CNN he won't vote for the package. He argues utilities already are moving away from coal, so it doesn't make sense to "pay companies to do what they're already doing." It's not the blatant self interest and lobbying that I find most offensive, but the need for these politicians to make up such silly lies and the gullibility of the constituents who accept them.

Proven 5y ago
I find most offensive that someone can decide what to do with my money, or make international commitments for future fiscal spending even though the amount or anything else for that matter (including benefits) is completely unknown and there's absolutely no recourse for getting my money back in the case the plan doesn't work. Does anyone but public governments make spending decisions like that?
sul_tasto 5y ago
I’d like to think that if there were alternative good paying jobs in WV, many would gladly give up the coal mining jobs. It seems like this bill could be an opportunity for WV to chart a different course in exchange for its vote.
- nradov 5y ago
  Past efforts to retrain coal miners have been generally ineffective. President Biden told them to learn to code, which didn't go over too well. https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/476391-biden-tells-coal-miners-to-learn-to-code https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/47... I support efforts to give miners other opportunities but we have to be realistic about what's possible.
- causi 5y ago
  In the entire country there are less than sixty thousand coal miners. They're a political tool to be exploited by others; their own vote counts for almost nothing.
pirate787 5y ago
There is such ignorance and arrogance on the coasts about places like West Virginia. The state is extremely poor and coal is still a massively important industry. Manchin is driving a bargain and is representing his people, who've ruined their economy and environment powering the rest of the country for the last 100 years. The rest of the country needs to help make the impact on coal country manageable as part of the transition to clean energy.
- mistrial9 5y ago
  > There is such ignorance and arrogance on the coasts about places like West Virginia. yes, agree > The state is extremely poor ok > coal is still a massively important industry similar arguments could be made for plenty of industry, historically.. even going back 200 years > Manchin is driving a bargain and is representing his people you are dramatically off-base on this. People do not form industry, companies, their executives and stakeholders form industry. Individuals are paid wages and then also have expenses, for example to their landlords, and also a company store perhaps? > who've ruined their economy and environment many lives are suffering now, and in the past, agree > powering the rest of the country for the last 100 years wasted water, electricity and money, are not unique to our age > The rest of the country needs to help make the impact on coal country that has been an explicit goal for union organizers, environmentalists, policy makers and is a core reason to have a common governance. Your emotional appeal is probably well-meaning, but.. falls apart quickly. King Coal - your time is over
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
    > People do not form industry, companies, their executives and stakeholders form industry. Peoples' jobs are a part of industry. It's not just the CEOs and shareholders. And the point was, Manchin is not just representing CEOs. He's representing little peoples' jobs. At this point, you were kind of ignoring what pirate787 was actually saying, and therefore your reply was rather wasted. > ... and also a company store perhaps? This just looks like smear tactics. Are there any company stores in 2021? I'm pretty sure they're at least quite rare.
nradov 5y ago
You can question Sen. Manchin's motives but his statement isn't wrong. Coal is generally no longer price competitive with natural gas and renewables for power generation. The fleet mix is already shifting and will continue to do so even absent government mandates or subsidies. (There may be environmental reasons to accelerate that shift even faster.)
- TremendousJudge 5y ago
  if utilities move to natural gas we don't solve the emissions issue
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    Gas is a massive improvement over coal. The supply chain has tons less carbon per MW (pumps and pipes vs trains and trucks and drilled wells vs mines) Obviously there's huge pollution improvements. And most importantly gas can be throttled so it leaves lots of room for renewables to pick up load.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      It's an improvement, but insufficient to meet emissions objectives. Of course, if we taxed carbon we could actually rely on the market sorting itself out without gaping loopholes (e.g., virtually the entire transportation sector).
  - belltaco 5y ago
    CO2 isn't the only pollutant. https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/coal-and-the-environment.php#:~:text=Several%20principal%20emissions%20result%20from,respiratory%20illnesses%20and%20lung%20disease https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/coal-and-the-enviro... https://www.psr.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/coal-ash-hazardous-to-human-health.pdf https://www.psr.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/coal-ash-haza...
  - imtringued 5y ago
    Natural gas produces less emissions and act as a flexible backup for renewables. There is no good reason to support coal anymore and natural gas plants need expensive fuel which means they can't compete when wind and solar are producing power. It's the perfect compromise.
bpodgursky 5y ago
I'm not a fan of propping up the coal industry, but it's hard to argue that he's fighting against his constituent's interests here. WV is coal country — he's not lying to his base.
Pxtl 5y ago
Realistically the Democrats need to take more seats in the Senate so that people like Manchin and Sinema can be outvoted, but that's kind of impossible with the anti-democratic structure of the Senate giving disproportionate representation to the more sparsely-populated Republican-controlled states.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  I agree that Democrats need more seats, but the problem isn't the structure of the senate. A decade ago Democrats had the Rust belt and many other sparsely populated states were swing states, but they decided to go out of their way to alienate rural voters with extreme and unnecessary prejudice. Doubling down on identity politics from 2015-2020 only sealed the issue. Democrats have the better policies, but they pick completely unnecessary and counterproductive fights.
  - jgwil2 5y ago
    > they decided to go out of their way to alienate rural voters This is beside the point. Rural voters are overrepresented by the structure of the Senate. You could argue that Democrats have used poor political tactics, but the fact is that in a representative system they wouldn't need to kowtow to rural voters in order to get a majority.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      The "right" balance of representation between rural and urban voters is a subjective question, but I think the fact that one party can't both overwhelmingly succeed and repeatedly, deliberately, and overtly offend millions of voters suggests that the balance of representation is working properly. To put it a little differently, I want a political system that incentivizes cooperation and good behavior and disincentivizes bad divisiveness and bad behavior. In this particular case, our political system actually delivered on that. So while in many other regards our system may be broken, I don't think the balance of representation is particularly broken.
crisdux 5y ago
I find it offensive when folks on HN completely get the facts wrong and disparage people for no good reason. The utility industry has cut electricity generation from coal by 50% in about 15 years. Manchin is right.
- antattack 5y ago
  That was the easy half. Second half will be much harder to accomplish.
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    With cheap solar and cheap gas I don't see how it's going to be any harder than having the self control to not shoot ourselves in the foot before the coal infrastructure ages out.
- fweespeech 5y ago
  > The utility industry has cut electricity generation from coal by 50% in about 15 years. Manchin is right. The problem is, by common projections such as: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abandoning-60-percent-of-global-oil-and-gas-might-limit-warming-to-1-5-c/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abandoning-60-per... We need to cut it by another 60% by the end of the year. That is not happening without government intervention. You have to understand if you aren't 70+, this is going to impact you much worse the longer we wait to make changes.
- Dylan16807 5y ago
  The first half of his sentence is right. The full sentence and implications are not right.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  1. Manchin is a toad whose personal wealth is invested in the fossil fuel industry nevermind whatever the industry pays him to advocate for it. Manchin is the worst kind of moderate democrat, and he absolutely deserves to be disparaged. 2. What matters is the rate at which we're shedding emissions, not the rate at which we're cutting coal. Moving from coal to natural gas represents a reduction in emissions, but it's not enough to meet our emissions targets, hence this bill.

Proven 5y ago

I find most offensive that someone can decide what to do with my money, or make international commitments for future fiscal spending even though the amount or anything else for that matter (including benefits) is completely unknown and there's absolutely no recourse for getting my money back in the case the plan doesn't work. Does anyone but public governments make spending decisions like that?

sul_tasto 5y ago

I’d like to think that if there were alternative good paying jobs in WV, many would gladly give up the coal mining jobs. It seems like this bill could be an opportunity for WV to chart a different course in exchange for its vote.

nradov 5y ago
Past efforts to retrain coal miners have been generally ineffective. President Biden told them to learn to code, which didn't go over too well. https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/476391-biden-tells-coal-miners-to-learn-to-code https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/47... I support efforts to give miners other opportunities but we have to be realistic about what's possible.
causi 5y ago
In the entire country there are less than sixty thousand coal miners. They're a political tool to be exploited by others; their own vote counts for almost nothing.

pirate787 5y ago

There is such ignorance and arrogance on the coasts about places like West Virginia. The state is extremely poor and coal is still a massively important industry. Manchin is driving a bargain and is representing his people, who've ruined their economy and environment powering the rest of the country for the last 100 years. The rest of the country needs to help make the impact on coal country manageable as part of the transition to clean energy.

mistrial9 5y ago
> There is such ignorance and arrogance on the coasts about places like West Virginia. yes, agree > The state is extremely poor ok > coal is still a massively important industry similar arguments could be made for plenty of industry, historically.. even going back 200 years > Manchin is driving a bargain and is representing his people you are dramatically off-base on this. People do not form industry, companies, their executives and stakeholders form industry. Individuals are paid wages and then also have expenses, for example to their landlords, and also a company store perhaps? > who've ruined their economy and environment many lives are suffering now, and in the past, agree > powering the rest of the country for the last 100 years wasted water, electricity and money, are not unique to our age > The rest of the country needs to help make the impact on coal country that has been an explicit goal for union organizers, environmentalists, policy makers and is a core reason to have a common governance. Your emotional appeal is probably well-meaning, but.. falls apart quickly. King Coal - your time is over
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  > People do not form industry, companies, their executives and stakeholders form industry. Peoples' jobs are a part of industry. It's not just the CEOs and shareholders. And the point was, Manchin is not just representing CEOs. He's representing little peoples' jobs. At this point, you were kind of ignoring what pirate787 was actually saying, and therefore your reply was rather wasted. > ... and also a company store perhaps? This just looks like smear tactics. Are there any company stores in 2021? I'm pretty sure they're at least quite rare.

nradov 5y ago

You can question Sen. Manchin's motives but his statement isn't wrong. Coal is generally no longer price competitive with natural gas and renewables for power generation. The fleet mix is already shifting and will continue to do so even absent government mandates or subsidies. (There may be environmental reasons to accelerate that shift even faster.)

TremendousJudge 5y ago
if utilities move to natural gas we don't solve the emissions issue
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  Gas is a massive improvement over coal. The supply chain has tons less carbon per MW (pumps and pipes vs trains and trucks and drilled wells vs mines) Obviously there's huge pollution improvements. And most importantly gas can be throttled so it leaves lots of room for renewables to pick up load.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    It's an improvement, but insufficient to meet emissions objectives. Of course, if we taxed carbon we could actually rely on the market sorting itself out without gaping loopholes (e.g., virtually the entire transportation sector).
- belltaco 5y ago
  CO2 isn't the only pollutant. https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/coal-and-the-environment.php#:~:text=Several%20principal%20emissions%20result%20from,respiratory%20illnesses%20and%20lung%20disease https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/coal-and-the-enviro... https://www.psr.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/coal-ash-hazardous-to-human-health.pdf https://www.psr.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/coal-ash-haza...
- imtringued 5y ago
  Natural gas produces less emissions and act as a flexible backup for renewables. There is no good reason to support coal anymore and natural gas plants need expensive fuel which means they can't compete when wind and solar are producing power. It's the perfect compromise.

bpodgursky 5y ago

I'm not a fan of propping up the coal industry, but it's hard to argue that he's fighting against his constituent's interests here. WV is coal country — he's not lying to his base.

Pxtl 5y ago

Realistically the Democrats need to take more seats in the Senate so that people like Manchin and Sinema can be outvoted, but that's kind of impossible with the anti-democratic structure of the Senate giving disproportionate representation to the more sparsely-populated Republican-controlled states.

throwaway894345 5y ago
I agree that Democrats need more seats, but the problem isn't the structure of the senate. A decade ago Democrats had the Rust belt and many other sparsely populated states were swing states, but they decided to go out of their way to alienate rural voters with extreme and unnecessary prejudice. Doubling down on identity politics from 2015-2020 only sealed the issue. Democrats have the better policies, but they pick completely unnecessary and counterproductive fights.
- jgwil2 5y ago
  > they decided to go out of their way to alienate rural voters This is beside the point. Rural voters are overrepresented by the structure of the Senate. You could argue that Democrats have used poor political tactics, but the fact is that in a representative system they wouldn't need to kowtow to rural voters in order to get a majority.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    The "right" balance of representation between rural and urban voters is a subjective question, but I think the fact that one party can't both overwhelmingly succeed and repeatedly, deliberately, and overtly offend millions of voters suggests that the balance of representation is working properly. To put it a little differently, I want a political system that incentivizes cooperation and good behavior and disincentivizes bad divisiveness and bad behavior. In this particular case, our political system actually delivered on that. So while in many other regards our system may be broken, I don't think the balance of representation is particularly broken.

crisdux 5y ago

I find it offensive when folks on HN completely get the facts wrong and disparage people for no good reason. The utility industry has cut electricity generation from coal by 50% in about 15 years. Manchin is right.

antattack 5y ago
That was the easy half. Second half will be much harder to accomplish.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  With cheap solar and cheap gas I don't see how it's going to be any harder than having the self control to not shoot ourselves in the foot before the coal infrastructure ages out.
fweespeech 5y ago
> The utility industry has cut electricity generation from coal by 50% in about 15 years. Manchin is right. The problem is, by common projections such as: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abandoning-60-percent-of-global-oil-and-gas-might-limit-warming-to-1-5-c/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abandoning-60-per... We need to cut it by another 60% by the end of the year. That is not happening without government intervention. You have to understand if you aren't 70+, this is going to impact you much worse the longer we wait to make changes.
Dylan16807 5y ago
The first half of his sentence is right. The full sentence and implications are not right.
throwaway894345 5y ago
1. Manchin is a toad whose personal wealth is invested in the fossil fuel industry nevermind whatever the industry pays him to advocate for it. Manchin is the worst kind of moderate democrat, and he absolutely deserves to be disparaged. 2. What matters is the rate at which we're shedding emissions, not the rate at which we're cutting coal. Moving from coal to natural gas represents a reduction in emissions, but it's not enough to meet our emissions targets, hence this bill.