What is the method proposed now to quench the fire? Simply strip mining it would open up a huge barbecue.
There isn't one.
Anyone can write a column and make up stuff.
As wonderful as the free-market is, and Ayn Rand notwithstanding, unfettered capitalism isn't magic. There's no financial reason for a company to go in and mine that coal, and the technologies to put it out have failed miserably. Nobody has any serious answer.