Canada Plans To Phase Out Coal-Powered Electricity By 2030 (theguardian.com) 147
Last week, French president Francois Hollande announced that France will shut down all its coal-fired power plants by 2023. This week, Canada's environment minister, Kathleen McKenna, announced that Canada plans to phase out its use of coal-fired electricity by 2030. The Guardian reports: [McKenna] said the goal is to make sure 90% of Canada's electricity comes from sustainable sources by that time -- up from 80% today. The announcement is one of a series of measures Justin Trudeau's Liberal government is rolling out as part of a broader climate change plan. Trudeau also has plans to implement a carbon tax. "Taking traditional coal power out of our energy mix and replacing it with cleaner technologies will significantly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, improve the health of Canadians, and benefit generations for years to come," McKenna said. Four of Canada's 10 provinces still use coal-based electricity. Alberta had been working toward phasing out coal-fired electricity by 2030.
Coal in Canada? (Score:2, Interesting)
They don't even use the word "electricity" up there. They call it "hydro".
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Re:Coal in Canada? (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, it's called Hydro because in BC, Quebec and Newfoundland/Labrador most of the electricity is Hydroelectric. Alberta and Saskatchewan use primarily coal. Ontario is the only province that uses primarily Nuclear, Hydroelectic and Natural Gas, but their power distribution network is called Hydro One.
There are only 14 coal plants in Canada. 7 of them are in Alberta. 3 in Saskatchewan, 2 in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick has one of everything.
So shutting down the coal plants mostly impacts Alberta, and the fun fact is that Alberta can pretty much "mooch" off BC while it transitions to something else.
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Manitoba Hydro operates one coal fired unit in Brandon MB [hydro.mb.ca] that is used only during system emergencies
Re:Coal in Canada? (Score:5, Informative)
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Sure. And it also was one of the contributing factors to drive the price of electricity from $0.07kWh at peak to the current price of $0.18kWh at peak in less than a decade. Though the main culprit behind that is the "green energy" program here, which as paid at rates as high as $0.92kWh for generation. [financialpost.com] How it's effectively fucked us. [financialpost.com] How it's putting farmers out of business. [financialpost.com] How the government knew it was a bad idea from the start [nationalpost.com]. And it's shit like this that causes populist revolts. It is now so b
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I notice you fail to include any costs due to the environmental impact of using coal. Myopia, get it looked at.
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I notice you fail to include any costs due to the environmental impact of using coal. Myopia, get it looked at.
Far less then the immediate impact then say the steel industry, or the huge amount of smog that's in Toronto for example. But I'm sure if you lived here, you'd be perfectly fine paying the electricity rates that we are right? Or would you be one of those middle class people who are now one pay cheque shy of being unable to cover anything.
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Re: Coal in Canada? (Score:1)
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Be f***ed now, or be f***ed later. If you factor in the external cost coal is pretty expensive. But, those cost will have to be paid by someone else.
Considering losing cheap electricity counts for both? It means that tax bases dry up as companies move elsewhere, it means that there's less money for healthcare. It means that the government has to borrow more money to cover the existing programs at the same level. So you tell me what's worse, the fact that you're going to be buried alive in sovereign debt like Ontario is now -- and has the highest debt per-person of any western "state, province, or country" or you engage in short-term feel good politic
Blame Game (Score:2)
Yes and no.
Perhaps a bit of a gamble that didn't pay off and perhaps it could have been implemented better, but the environmental impacts are real. Unfortunately so is the economic impacts. It isn't exactly short term thinking, but the negative impacts are. Could still see some longer term gain. What is at odds are those generation contracts that basically subsidize green generation in Ontario making it attractive to investors. The idea was to bring "green" jobs to Ontario. However most of the generation st
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The liberals have been in power in Ontario over over 12 years. Yes, you can put all the blame directly on their shoulders for this. It was their actions to not change and re-regulate(never mind that my electricity bill in my co-op in FL is literally 1/3 of what I pay here), it was their actions to pass the "green energy act" it was their choice not to learn from places like Greece which did the same thing. Their electricity rates went through the roof, and those "green energy jobs" never materialized eit
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Yeah I guess I was thinking framing in terms of "crops" not livestock, but even then compared to I'd say most other industries it isn't even near the top of the electricity consumers, even considering livestock and say milk production for example.
As far as alternative sources to alternative sources :) Well again it isn't all that simple either. NG? Well there was the afore mentioned scandal which is totally on the Liberals, which more less caused the "retirement" of the leader. In that case it was of course
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You forgot one of the biggest reasons of large hydro bills in Ontario, and it wasn't the switch away from coal. The debt retirement charge where we, the customer, got to pay off the debt of Ontario Hydro when it went private and was broken up into Hydro One and all the other various utilities. And not only did we get to pay off that debt, we got to do it twice because instead of putting that money towards the debt the first time the provincial government used it for other things.
Bzzt. Ontario hasn't had a debt retirement charge on it's bill in almost half a decade. Removing the coal plants caused a small spike in prices. The green energy programs caused a huge spike because the rate they were paying were between 0.40-0.92kWh into the grid due to FIT programs. Where as nuke, hydro and NG are under 0.07kWh in production costs.
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"This had the greenhouse gas reduction equivalent ..."
And all this accomplished -what-, in terms of climactic effect?
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A step taken voluntarily will last longer than a step made at the point of a sword. IOW: absent emergencies, governments should adjust incentives, and gently.
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IOW: absent emergencies, governments should adjust incentives, and gently.
I agree completely. Governments are currently taking a top down approach where they pick the winners (feed in tariffs for solar/government investment in emerging technologies/etc) and losers (efficiency standards/banning coal/etc). Government actions will never be as efficient as market driven solutions. Surprisingly even most of the candidates running for the Canadian federal Conservative Party leadership are advocating "big government" solutions.
Only the Conservative leadership candidate Michael Chon
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The coal phase-out is on course to happen a lot sooner in Alberta. Our provincial government has made climate change a major part of its platform, which also includes leading the charge towards a "carbon tax" designed to cap carbon-emitters by placing an economic penalty on going over the limit.
Mixed feelings about this. It's impossible to deny man made climate change exists, on the other hand we seem to be moving at a faster pace than our ability to replace our energy needs with cleaner/renewable sources.
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And Alberta is ALREADY transitioning away from coal. In fact, earlier this year BC and Alberta (they're neighbouring provinces) signed an agreement where Alberta will start getting electricity from BC in the meantime.
So the impact to Alberta will be far lower in the end because Alberta is already trying to move away from coal.
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Yeah, it's called Hydro because in BC, Quebec and Newfoundland/Labrador most of the electricity is Hydroelectric. Alberta and Saskatchewan use primarily coal. Ontario is the only province that uses primarily Nuclear, Hydroelectic and Natural Gas, but their power distribution network is called Hydro One.
There are only 14 coal plants in Canada. 7 of them are in Alberta. 3 in Saskatchewan, 2 in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick has one of everything.
So shutting down the coal plants mostly impacts Alberta, and the fun fact is that Alberta can pretty much "mooch" off BC while it transitions to something else.
I am most familiar with the plants in Nova Scotia, so I will comment on those. Nova Scotia is essentially an island by both geography and the current grid. There is a HV line to New Brunswick, but capacity is only around 350MW. Nova Scotia does also have a line to Newfoundland but this is an underwater line of limited capacity also. Wind is not a reliable option, and utility-scale solar has issues due to the high latitude and punishing winters.
The power station at Lingan is ancient in terms of desig
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sell coal to China (Score:1)
Even the Chinese have had enough (Score:4, Informative)
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See here. [wikipedia.org] So good luck with that. There are limits to the amount of pollution folks will tolerate. China and India have long since reached those limits.
Given the every increasing pollution levels in Delhi, I don't know if India has actually reached their limit yet...
As a depressing example [firstpost.com]...
2030 will be 3 elections away ... (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes ... let's keep kicking those environmental issues down the road. Fourteen years should give plenty of opportunity to blame some other government when this (and many other distant promises) don't actually happen ...
Re:2030 will be 3 elections away ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes ... let's keep kicking those environmental issues down the road. Fourteen years should give plenty of opportunity to blame some other government when this (and many other distant promises) don't actually happen ...
If the the new Administration does ignore Global Warming (and indeed, rolls back the paltry reductions that have already been put into place), I wonder if that opens up the USA to huge reparation payments down the road when other countries are forced to make huge expenditures due to the climate change?
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It's all moot.
Canada shot itself in the foot on this one.
Replacing coal is very good for the photo-ops, but no leader is using shale oil fields as a backdrop.
Nope (Score:3)
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It will be like Trump's wall. If you want other good trade deals or access to resources, you have to pay to mitigate climate change first.
Actually it's likely that the EU will just force the US to clean up anyway, like it did with China. Chinese companies had to become RoHS compliant and reduce their carbon emissions in order to sell to the EU market, and if Trump wants the US to become a big exporter of manufactured goods again then they will have to meet the standards set in other countries.
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Ultimately the USA needs to export. If the other countries EU, Japan, China etc. demand something for access to their markets the USA will have little choice but to comply.
As an example show me a laptop that is not RoHS compliant that you can buy in the good old don't need to listen to anyone else USA?
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Well they could just turn them off now, but then how will you power whatever device you used to post your self righteous comment?
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This should be a global effort. (Score:5, Informative)
Coal is the least efficient and highest polluting method of power generation in the commercial market and everyone should be trying to eliminate it everywhere on the planet. If there was ever one method of power generation to eliminate, it's coal power.
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Nonsensical comment is nonsensical.
Solar efficiency has nothing to do with coal efficiency. One has the input fall from the sky and the other has to be dug up and burned.
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Coal converts 30-40% of the energy in the expended fuel to electricity. Solar converts a lot more than 100% of the energy in the expended fuel to electricity. Solar is more efficient.
Those 10-25% measure something else, which also happens to be a kind of efficiency, but that doesn't make it a meaningful comparison.
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When considering solar efficiency, one must consider the raw material extraction and manufacturing energy, which are a much higher percentage (Construction MWh per Lifetime MWh) for PV construction than they are for conventional power plant construction.
Then there is fuel extraction, which is higher for coal. Efficiency is important for that portion of coal. But efficiency itself isn't a good comparison if you are really concerned about CO2 production. The only thing that should matter is CO2 per MWh for c
Hydrocarbon exports (Score:2)
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Not Enough (Score:2)
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Germany has no intention of eliminating fossil fuel burning in the near or even the far future. At the moment they generate 40% of their electricity demand from coal and lignite. They *hope* to have reduced their coal and lignite consumption by 2050 but it's a big industry and employer, and they have billions of tonnes of extractable lignite resources within their own borders so it's not going to disappear completely. They have legislated the shutdown of their non-fossil nuclear power plants by 2023 and tha
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You are an idiot.
Germay originally planned to be CO2 till 2030, that goal is now postponed till 240 or 2060.
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There is zero evidence that Germany plans to abandon burning lignite any time this century, never mind 2040 or 2060. There have been lots of fanciful announcements about renewables taking over and the end of fossil CO2 emissions but the facts don't agree. Ten years ago Germany generated about 40% of its electricity from coal and lignite, about 290 TWhrs. In 2015 it generated about 40% of its electricity from coal and lignite, about 270 TWhrs. The increase in renewables generation over that period has been b
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There is zero evidence that Germany plans to abandon burning lignite any time this century, never mind 2040 or 2060. ... in your dreams. No idea why you post nonsense like the rest of your post.
Yeah
and start replacing their first-generation wind turbines and solar installations which are reaching end-of-life
E.g. what is that supposed to mean? Wind turbines are replaced regularly and solar plants don't have an end of life.
If you want accurate numbers I would suggest to improve your google foo, or check this:
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Near as I could figure it, Fraunhofer doesn't do coal, they only offer renewables (solar and wind) so it's not relevant. Here's a result from Google showing in chart form the last ten years or so of German electricity production (2005 - 2014):
http://energytransition.de/201... [energytransition.de]
Over the ten year period shown in the first chart non-carbon-emitting green nuclear production is down, renewable production is up and CO2-emitting coal and lignite production is not changing very much. The lowest production was i
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Fraunhofer publishes figures about all energy production. Even if the titles in the publications usually say "renewable", it is always compared to the other forms of production, otherwise it would be meaningless.
Nevertheless an interesting site/link.
obama job killer (Score:1)
so setting up a 10-15 year game plan so its phased out and lowers job loss ...obama shoulda done this instead of dropping the hammer on a whole industry
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This a thousand times over. Nothing Obama did killed coal. Cheap fracked gas killed coal. Just like cheap North Sea gas killed coal in the UK.
Heck it is cheaper to just burn the fracked gas instead of coal in a conventional coal plant than burn coal, let alone compete with a combined cycle gas plant.
Unless you want to stop fracking for gas in the USA, and good luck with that, coal is never combing back.
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If only Australia would follow suit (Score:2)
If only our government was smart and set some policy settings encouraging the building of renewables (we have plenty of places in this country that would be perfect for baseload solar setups plus wind power, biofuels, geothermal and more) rather than digging yet more coal out of the ground and burning it (or using coal seam gas which is almost as bad)
Don't worry... (Score:2)
Since when does theory push policy? (Score:2)
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I think you should be modded "-1 fucking ignorant moron".
Re:Great, just what we need... (Score:5, Funny)
Wait... wrong channel.
I see sandworms. Yep, global warming.
Re:Great, just what we need... (Score:5, Informative)
> as I write this post, it's snowing heavily outside and there's over a foot of snow on the ground.
So because it's cold somewhere, global warming doesn't exist, excellent logic. Countervailing point: When I moved to Vancouver 30 years ago nobody needed air conditioning and winters saw about 1-2 weeks of snow. The last 10 years there's been annual runs on all stores in the summer where they can't keep air conditioners in stock, and I haven't seen a single flake on the ground in 6 years.
However, as you wrote that post it is also TWENTY DEGREES warmer than it should be in the arctic.
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/north-pole-20-degrees-warmer-than-normal-as-winter-descends
Note, that's also the National Post, the right wing rag of Canada, so if THEY are publishing it, there must be some fire behind that smoke.
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Note, that's also the National Post, the right wing rag of Canada, so if THEY are publishing it, there must be some fire behind that smoke.
National Post hasn't been right-wing for almost 3 years. Just a FYI. They decided to start pushing lefty agendas and people are fleeing in droves from the paper. Just like they've fled Toronto Star and Globe and Mail. NAPO in it's wisdom decided to even double down, and subscriber and page views continue to drop.
I live in Ontario, we've got 2cm on the ground you're welcome to take. Then again, you dig back through the historical records and you'll quickly find that your weather is normal. The snow was
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:1)
Weather is not climate and Global warming doesn't mean that everywhere gets warmer all the time; the term "climate change" is better as it discourages such misunderstandings.
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, Saskatchewan has the last pseudo-skeptic Premier in the country. Of course, the pseudo-skeptics like Postmedia (the Canadian oil industry's advertising branch masquerading as a newspaper chain) is cheering for Trump to kill the US's involvement in the Paris agreement, and naturally insisting "Well, there's no point to Canada fighting climate change, because the US won't".
Meanwhile, the very same newspaper chain is reporting that the Arctic is 20 degrees warmer than normal [nationalpost.com] for this time of year.
I keep thinking that some point really soon the mounting evidence of serious climate shifts will override even the hardest critics, but then again, AGW pseudoskepticism has become a sort of a cult of its own, which follows the same bizarre and idiotic credo of the Creationists, both groups declaring almost every other day "Any day now, that nasty scientific theory I hate is going to be disproven."
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When the fossil fuel dividends finally start to dry up due to more and more competitive renewables, so will much of the yelling fade. The only ones left will be the poor tools who were zealots without getting paid for it.
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I keep thinking that some point really soon the mounting evidence of serious climate shifts will override even the hardest critics, but then again, AGW pseudoskepticism has become a sort of a cult of its own, which follows the same bizarre and idiotic credo of the Creationists, both groups declaring almost every other day "Any day now, that nasty scientific theory I hate is going to be disproven."
I think that calling them pseudoskeptics bestows too much grace on them. What they really are is anti-science denialists.
And they (like the Creationists) are not waiting for their least-favorite scientific theory to be disproven. They simply reject the parts of science that are inconvenient to them.
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"They simply reject the parts of science that are inconvenient to them"
I keep hoping some of them will find gravity inconvenient.
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:2)
I thought you science-y people always tell us knuckledraggers not to equate weather with climate. Which is it?
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Well, we more or less assume you'll come to accept evolution to some degree, but it is clear being "knuckledraggers", it hasn't yet happened for you.
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The entire Arctic circle being warmer isn't merely a weather disturbance.
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:1)
Bullshit.
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I don't live there, but it sounds like a good thing.
It's a good thing until it turns into drought.
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't live there, but it sounds like a good thing.
By many measures, Canada and Russia are the biggest "winners" from global warming. They benefit from warmer temps, longer growing seasons, more land in the cultivation zone, etc. So it is a bit ironic that Canada is making commitments to reduce CO2, while America (a big net loser) is backsliding.
Re: Great, just what we need... (Score:4, Informative)
I don't live there, but it sounds like a good thing.
By many measures, Canada and Russia are the biggest "winners" from global warming. They benefit from warmer temps, longer growing seasons, more land in the cultivation zone, etc. So it is a bit ironic that Canada is making commitments to reduce CO2, while America (a big net loser) is backsliding.
A lot of Russia is trapped, frozen methane and an increasing amount of it is thawing and venting. Not a good thing if it increases. Canada has been seeing more & larger forest fires and coupled with the die-off of trees from infestation, wildfires are going to get worse over time.
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They benefit from warmer temps, longer growing seasons, more land in the cultivation zone, etc.
I wouldn't be so fast at calling that simply benefits - when the permafrost thaws, it causes a large number of issues, such as soil instability, ecological upheavals etc etc, not to mention the potentially huge release of methane from gas hydrates and other sources that are now kept frozen. Warmer climate may sound good, but there will be a transition period in which things are going to look grim, and it won't be over in a few years - it can probably go on for centuries.
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This is the biggest nonsense you ever wrote.
Spring starts how many days earlier in Canada and Russia? One day? Two days?
What about winter? Yes winter is significantly later in terms of temperature. But not regarding daylight.
And the extended 'warmths' is irrelevant: harvest time is when harvest time is.
In other words: the climate change has no effect right now on food production. Perhaos in 20 years when we can plant differnet crops that fitt the new climate and has a better yield.
But I doubt it. Limiting f
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we call this not being selfish.
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The UK switched to gas years ago. It was Thatcher and her successor John Major who phased out the British coal industry since it was uneconomical. Odd that in America the preservation of coal is seen as a conservative ideal, whereas in the UK it was the left that was trying to keep it alive in the interests of the workers. I guess the definition of conservative in America must require anything that beats the crap out of the environment whether it pays its way or not.
Re:Just switch to Natural Gas (Score:5, Informative)
It's actually not a conservative thing. It's that the Republican Party, which is sort-of conservative, is controlled by a few monied elite that have significant fossil fuel interests. Therefore, in the U.S., fossil fuels = conservative cause, but not because it has anything to do with actual conservative ideology.
Re:Just switch to Natural Gas (Score:4, Interesting)
but not because it has anything to do with actual conservative ideology.
Actually, there are those in the Republican party who view environmentalism as a New Age, satanic cult. They equate it to a worship of Mother Earth, and therefore view it as inherently evil and unGodly.
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I increasingly believe /. needs a "+1 True, but depressing"
Re: Just switch to Natural Gas (Score:2)
Sorry we passed peak Truth a while ago and are rapidly entering the post-truth era, the Postfactocene.
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That's what "insightful" was supposed to be.
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Re:Just switch to Natural Gas (Score:4, Insightful)
Odd that in America the preservation of coal is seen as a conservative ideal
That is just political pandering. Coal is dying because of simple economics. It can't compete with cheap shale gas, and Trump can't do a damn thing about that. The coal miners in Appalachia need to get on the bus and move somewhere that has jobs.
Re:Just switch to Natural Gas (Score:5, Funny)
The joke's on you. We're about to have CLEAN COAL starting January 21.
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Odd that in America the preservation of coal is seen as a conservative ideal
That is just political pandering. Coal is dying because of simple economics.
So was slavery. Doesn't meant the South won't go to war over it.
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So was slavery. Doesn't meant the South won't go to war over it.
The South lost the war, and slavery ended. The same will happen with coal.
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The UK switched to gas years ago. It was Thatcher and her successor John Major who phased out the British coal industry since it was uneconomical. Odd that in America the preservation of coal is seen as a conservative ideal, whereas in the UK it was the left that was trying to keep it alive in the interests of the workers. I guess the definition of conservative in America must require anything that beats the crap out of the environment whether it pays its way or not.
No, it was just a cynical pumping of the people who may have lost their jobs by the conservatives. They aren't going to get their jobs back, but thanks for the vote. Also, the people who own the Conservative politicians have a pretty big self interest in preserving coal use, so its a core principle.
Regardless, automation has done more to eliminate coal jobs than anything else. What once upon a time took armies of men, digging with pickaxes and dinky cars is now accomplished by a few people.
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Because there's no other way at all to heat a home... [wikipedia.org]
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I love ground source heat pumps, I really do, but they are expensive to install. Especially in an urban setting. Last year I replaced my natural gas furnace and I looked into the options available to me. The ground source heat pump was about five times the price of a lower priced high end natural gas furnace and A/C when you added the cost of having a company come in and drill the holes for the loops. The newer air source heat pumps which are now able to handle most of Eastern Ontario winters are about
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Coal is the lame duck. It should be easy to get rid off it. Natural Gas? No way we are giving it up. Imagine heating up all these homes in the winter with anything other than natural gas.
Natural gas emits about half the greenhouse gas as coal per thermal unit and burns considerably cleaner, but is still a problem.
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Well, one could just feed upgraded biogas into the system.
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No, we're not heading for another ice age, and no "real scientific evidence" proves it.
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Your own private definition of "ice age"? Suggest you try this one instead: ice age implies the presence of extensive ice sheets in both northern and southern hemispheres. By this definition, we are in an interglacial period [wikipedia.org]
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Trump 2020.
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After Americans find he's sold the roads, bridges, etc. from his infrastructure "expenditure" to companies (and given them tax reductions for the privilege of owning these assets), it isn't clear he'll have a mandate for anything except the retirement home...which he'll have built for himself at government expense and for which he'll charge admission for visits.