Cost of New E.P.A. Coal Rules: Up to 1,400 More Deaths a Year

[skold]

This is a reality that no one wants to accept, but they need to hear.

Nearly all human life on this planet is sustained by the conversion of fuel to energy.

If that conversion is curved in any way, millions of people will die. Areas won't get the development they would have otherwise had. Medicines wouldn't be manufactured at nearly the numbers that they are now, or distributed nearly as far as they would otherwise have been.

Sometimes the sun doesn't shine, sometimes the wind doesn't blow, yet our need for energy remains constant.

Do I wish our circumstances were different? Absolutely. Despite that, I still recognize that this is the circumstance that we find ourselves in today. Converting fuel into more energy is clearly the path to preserving the most amount of human life.

You're not going to find a perfect solution. As Milton Friedman once said: "Nirvana is not for this world".

Sometimes... Well actually no, ALL ThE FUCKING TIME, natural gas is cleaner and superior to coal in every single way imaginable.

Coal is the Blockbuster of energy..

 

[Madmick]

I appreciate the fact that people are earnestly looking into ways to make these energy alternatives viable. If we're being honest with ourselves, batteries still isn't a solution to the energy consumption needs of over 7 billion people. It has the potential to be in the future, but it's not turn-key ready right now, yet our need for energy remains constant.

I hope you're right, and this becomes a viable energy alternative. Until then, we will still convert fuel to energy to sustain the most amount of human life, despite the restraints of the technology of our day.

I said this is the "future".

That station is set to achieve 500MW output in the next 1-2 years (we already have 100MW solar stations in California), and they're taking it more slowly as it is a pilot program. They are not in production mode, so to speak. Right now it would take 34,000 stations of that output to meet global energy demand.

Certainly, that sounds daunting, but when you consider that we have over 1.1 million oil wells in the USA alone, and over 700 oil refineries globally, when these only account for a portion of our overall energy usage, you realize it is quite doable on a global scale. It's just going to take a solid century to build them all. In the meantime, we need to do our best to keep that energy demand from swelling.

 

[MadSquabbles500]

If Trump tries to make Murka energy self sufficient, and expands his trade war in order to achieve that, then we be expanding our own coal production anyways. It wont even matter if rules/regulations are tight. Domestic coal will be in demand.

 

[Andy Capp]

If Trump tries to make Murka energy self sufficient, and expands his trade war in order to achieve that, then we be expanding our own coal production anyways. It wont even matter if rules/regulations are tight. Domestic coal will be in demand.

In 2017, 82% of domestic coal used was for electricity production (source). It stands to reason there would be a 1-1 relationship between alternative supplies of electricity and reductions in domestic demand for coal. As for coal exports, which actually significantly increased last year, I think it's fair to say we should strongly encourage the importers to follow after this hypothetical North American leadership in renewables (edit:while helping coal miners, since they are losing their jobs to automation anyway with retraining and other opportunities).

 

[HIMBOB]

Looks like fuzzy math.

How so?

 

[Fawlty]

Trump could sell these people warm, solid, dry water.

 

[HIMBOB]

“We love clean, beautiful West Virginia coal,” Mr. Trump said at a political rally Tuesday evening in West Virginia, the heart of American coal country. “And you know, that’s indestructible stuff. In times of war, in times of conflict, you can blow up those windmills, they fall down real quick. You can blow up pipelines, they go like this,” he said, making a hand gesture. “You can do a lot of things to those solar panels, but you know what you can’t hurt? Coal.”

It's stunning how retarded this guy is. He's talking about the potential destruction of the conversion and delivery methods of wind and oil and solar.

But then, when it comes to coal, he's just referring to its existence in the ground. As if a bombing raid on railroad lines or coal plants isn't going to affect the use of coal as a fuel source.

So centralised energy production is less able to be bombed than decentralised?

Fucking wow, you gotta give it to Trump the man will and sell anything.

 

[badascan]

I will be working with coal today and hauling 50k tons or more to a power plant...

 

[*Z*]

This is a reality that no one wants to accept, but they need to hear.

Nearly all human life on this planet is sustained by the conversion of fuel to energy.

If that conversion is curved in any way, millions of people will die. Areas won't get the development they would have otherwise had. Medicines wouldn't be manufactured at nearly the numbers that they are now, or distributed nearly as far as they would otherwise have been.

Sometimes the sun doesn't shine, sometimes the wind doesn't blow, yet our need for energy remains constant.

Do I wish our circumstances were different? Absolutely. Despite that, I still recognize that this is the circumstance that we find ourselves in today. Converting fuel into more energy is clearly the path to preserving the most amount of human life.

You're not going to find a perfect solution. As Milton Friedman once said: "Nirvana is not for this world".

Ah yes, the great energy crisis of 2018. If we don't get more coal plants up and running we will surely be running out of energy any time now.

 

[*Z*]

As a former coal miner, I feel sorry for the people of West Virginia. For many people coal jobs are a source of life for not only individual people that live there, but for their entire community’s. The loss of those jobs has litterly cutt the life-lines of their livelihoods, and the people that live there have been neglected for decades. No one else will help these people. Trump must sound like a saving grace to them.

They need to do something about it, you can't rely on a dying industry to suddenly come back. The whole country can't move backwards because a few won't move forward.

 

[ObamaPhoneLady]

So centralised energy production is less able to be bombed than decentralised?

Fucking wow, you gotta give it to Trump the man will and sell anything.

Anything in America is harder to bomb because you have to get to America first without getting shot down.

 

[HIMBOB]

This is a reality that no one wants to accept, but they need to hear.

Nearly all human life on this planet is sustained by the conversion of fuel to energy.

If that conversion is curved in any way, millions of people will die. Areas won't get the development they would have otherwise had. Medicines wouldn't be manufactured at nearly the numbers that they are now, or distributed nearly as far as they would otherwise have been.

Sometimes the sun doesn't shine, sometimes the wind doesn't blow, yet our need for energy remains constant.

Do I wish our circumstances were different? Absolutely. Despite that, I still recognize that this is the circumstance that we find ourselves in today. Converting fuel into more energy is clearly the path to preserving the most amount of human life.

You're not going to find a perfect solution. As Milton Friedman once said: "Nirvana is not for this world".

All basically true, yet in no way a justification for supporting coal.

Energy production is the future of course, but why use inefficient means when better alternatives exist.

I will be working with coal today and hauling 50k tons or more to a power plant...

Remember to use your legs.

 

[HIMBOB]

Anything in America is harder to bomb because you have to get to America first without getting shot down.

Which further underlines his disrespect of general American intelligence.

 

[Farmer Br0wn]

When I worked construction I worked for a guy who sold sand. We built his MASSIVE 10,000 square foot house. He ended up not being able to pay on time because all of his sand contracts. He was a cunt.

After 6 months of missing final payments he tried to pay the general contractor with sand.

lol

Please tell me he was told to pound sand.

I would be pretty disappointed if that wasn't the exact verbiage.

 

[Farmer Br0wn]

All basically true, yet in no way a justification for supporting coal.

Energy production is the future of course, but why use inefficient means when better alternatives exist.

It's absolutely is a justification for the use of coal power.

The reason we use it is because we need the energy now. If we didn't need the energy right now because energy was plentiful and cheap, we wouldn't even be discussing the use of coal or the need for alternative energies.

It's precisely because we don't have cheap or plentiful energy that we were talking about things like coal and alternative energy sources in the future.

 

[HIMBOB]

It's absolutely is a justification for the use of coal power.

The reason we use it is because we need the energy now. If we didn't need the energy right now because energy was plentiful and cheap, we wouldn't even be discussing the use of coal or the need for alternative energies.

It's precisely because we don't have cheap or plentiful energy that we were talking about things like coal and alternative energy sources in the future.

So you need cheap energy now right.

Let's look at coals ability to fill that need.

Coal energy production from an existing well maintained plant is cheap, that's true. But every well maintained plant is already in use. So that's not going to increase energy production.

You can of course build more coal powered generators but they are they have a 3-5 year lead time and are more expensive than other options. They also take 50 years to pay off, 50 years of legislative risk.

You aren't going to see any private company building new plants without the government effectively guaranteeing their returns for several decades.

The future is wind (cheap) and solar (production naturally matched with peak daily demand, daytime), supported by gas peaking plants and batteries (including hydro).