Blog

31Aug

How to Make the Next Labor Day Better than this One

August 31, 2016 Like Christmas with no gifts, this is Labor Day with no good jobs – at least not for the near record number of jobless Americans who want them. Average hourly wages have barely budged since the recession ended four years ago. So this week count on the administration to airbrush its record […]
24Aug

Why Voters May Soon Be Angry Over Energy

August 24, 2016 As the campaign gets underway in earnest, an always intriguing exercise for those keeping score at home will be to hear how the candidates address pocketbook issues. These are the ones – not national security, the national debt, lousy cable TV offerings, etc. – that are upper most in the minds of […]
17Aug

A Note to the Candidates

August 17, 2016 Dear Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton: If there’s any good news for coal these days, it’s that you both have promised relief for coal communities hit hard by market forces and the president’s regulations. Donald Trump, you say you’ll put coal miners back to work. Hillary Clinton, you pledged to put their […]
10Aug

Administration Wins Gold

Washington, D.C. – The games got underway this weekend and already Team USA has claimed a coveted gold medal. But not in Rio. Actually America won the prize here in Washington, for most regulations exceeding $100 million for a two-term president. With an estimated cost of $743 billion for it regulatory marathon – larger than […]
03Aug

Off to the Coal (aka “Swing”) States

August 3, 2016 This week finds the candidates embarking on campaign swings through battleground states – Colorado with nine electoral votes, Virginia with 13, Pennsylvania with 20 and Ohio with 18. Another description for battleground states is “coal states.” Like most toss-up states this year, they either produce or use lots of coal, and sometimes […]
27Jul

Holdren the Heretic

July 27, 2016 It’s hardly newsworthy when energy experts question the “keep it in the ground” doctrine, the new battle cry of fossil fuel critics. This doctrine has now become the litmus test for the party faithful gathering in Philadelphia this week. In fact, a specific commitment to keep fossils in the ground was even […]
21Jul

Keep Americans Employed and Safe with Abundant Coal

July 21, 2016 Recent headlines remind us that we no longer live in a secure world, if we ever did. Whether it is economic security or national security, the mood of the country suggests Americans today have less of both. So it’s understandable that GOP conventioneers would seize on jobs and safety as twin themes […]
12Jul

Lost Production Equals Lost Employment from the Clean Power Plan

July 13, 2016 The administration has long blamed coal’s troubles on the marketplace, not on its regulations. In congressional hearings, all the president’s men and women discount the impact of the Clean Power Plan on jobs, coal communities and the grid – even as they claim credit for regulating coal out of the grid when […]
07Jul

Searching for the Power Plan’s Benefits

July 7, 2016 In a House subcommittee hearing this week, Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) echoed the doubts of many when he questioned the benefits of this administration’s anti-coal regulations –  leaving aside the legality of them. In a “where’s the beef” remark, Rep. Barton told agency air chief Janet McCabe he was hard pressed to […]
29Jun

An Energy Plank for Costlier Electricity

June 26, 2016 The initial meeting of the Democratic Platform Committee last week proposed a little noticed shift in the party’s energy policy – one that carries high risks and costs to match for the U.S. economy.  If this proposal stands, it would, for the first time, reject the “all of the above” energy approach […]