Blog

20Sep

All the News Not Fit to Print

September 20, 2017 While Washington’s “war on coal” has ended – with this administration’s decision makers taking a fuel-neutral approach to regulation – the New York Times editorial board is nostalgic for the days of politicians picking winners and losers in the energy market. In what have now become weekly anti-coal tirades, the Times picks […]
12Sep

Weathering the Storms

September 12, 2017 Nature has rudely interrupted a static Beltway debate about grid reliability and the need for baseload power. The series of powerful storms swept through sprawling cities and Caribbean villages, annihilating every structure in their path. For hundreds of thousands of people impoverished by nature’s fury is now added the lack of electricity. […]
28Aug

The Oracle at DOE

August 28th, 2017 In Greek mythology, the Oracle at Delphi spoke so cryptically that both Athenians and rival Spartans could hear what they wanted to hear. Both sides found something to like. Secretary Perry’s staff’s study on grid “resilience” accomplished much the same thing. Call it Delphic wisdom. The renewable energy industry was relieved to […]
16Aug

Coal, the Comeback Kid

August 16, 2017 Neither the dead nor the living read their obituaries. Coal isn’t reading them because it isn’t dead.From the 2nd quarter of 2016 to the same period this year, coal production rose almost 17 percent. The number of new met mines in Central Appalachia rose from 155 to 212 in the year ending […]
09Aug

States Find New Friends

August 9, 2017: Last week, two seemingly disparate events showed how some in the Trump administration are holding fast to promises and principles. Both events encouraged state partnership and welfare in energy development. The first event was a subdued birthday party at the Department of the Interior, where the Office of Surface Mining and Regulatory […]
02Aug

A Better Way for an EV World

August 2, 2017 Last week Tesla rolled out its Model 3, creating the kind of wait-in-line excitement usually reserved for smart phone roll outs. The difference here is that Tesla’s product heralds real, disruptive change – the astonishing growth of the electric vehicle (EV) industry. Bloomberg Finance forecasts EVs could claim 35 percent of the […]
26Jul

Coal’s Benefits: Seen Only When Gone

July 26, 2017 The front-page story in Sunday’s Washington Post was a despairing look at the human cost of “the collapse of the coal industry.”  “Disabled and Disdained” is an example of a growing interest by both broadcast and print media in the social destruction left in the wake of a vanishing industry and the […]
19Jul

Kemper’s Collapse – A Speed Bump, Not a Dead End

July 19, 2017 When the Kemper Power Plant finally folded its cards, it prompted a shrill chorus of “we told you so’s” from the guardians of renewable energy. The  foundation-fueled NGOs see in Kemper’s collapse the death Nell of “clean coal”. Pity about those  miners now without a future, they say. Whatever can we do […]
14Jul

Hamburg and Wilsonville

July 13, 2017 As the president debated environmental and economic concerns with G-20 worthies in Hamburg last week, his cabinet officers were discussing them with locals here at home. “America first,” a serviceable description of the administration’s message, predictably played better here than over there. Energy Secretary Perry pitched advanced coal technologies at a visit […]
28Jun

Green Fantasy Gets Bad Reviews

June 28, 2017 Just in time for Energy Week comes a new paper by 21 academicians, all from prestigious research institutions, that drives a stake in the heart of the prevailing renewable energy fantasy. The authors, writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences last week, systematically demolish the claim made in the […]