Among the issues most commonly discussed are individuality, the rights of the individual, the limits of legitimate government, morality, history, economics, government policy, science, business, education, health care, energy, and man-made global warming evaluations. My posts are aimed at intelligent and rational individuals, whose comments are very welcome.

"No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it." Ayn Rand

"Observe that the 'haves' are those who have freedom, and that it is freedom that the 'have-nots' have not." Ayn Rand

"The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice', but integrity." Ayn Rand

For "a human being, the question 'to be or not to be,' is the question 'to think or not to think.'" Ayn Rand

17 September 2014

Obama Cannot Kill King Coal

Some time ago I wrote an article called King Coal Will Continue to Rule the World.  To follow up on that with aspects of the current situation let us note that:
  • Japanese demand for natural gas increased greatly following the Fukushima disaster.  This fueled an increase in natural gas prices throughout Asia and Europe.
  • With natural gas prices so high in Europe, where little fracking is taking place, natural gas is affordable for energy production for electricity only during peak demand periods.
  • What is affordable in Europe and elsewhere is American coal.  US coal exports increased from 50.1 billion tons six years ago to 129 billion tons.  This is an increase by a factor of 2.57 times!
  • If you buy into the garbage idea that man's CO2 emissions have a catastrophic impact by causing severe global warming, is it really better that US coal be burned around the rest of the world and not in the electric generating plants of the US?  Does it really make sense for us to increase our electricity costs by not using coal so the rest of the world can lower their costs by using American coal?
  • If you believe that coal-fired power plants produce very harmful emissions such as mercury and sulfur, is it better to have our coal burned in power plants most of which are not as well scrubbed as our power plants?  Of course, I have shown that mercury is not the problem our EPA has made it out to be here and here.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Your articles and posts are absolutely wonderful, refreshing, and enlightening Mr. Anderson. I greatly appreciate the work you do here. We need more beacons of rationality and reason in our world today.