You said, “why don’t we do that...”. Who is the we you are referring to?
It’s common on this forum to talk about oil and gas as if it some sort of treasure that we all have in common. But it is not. Real people risk their own money to discover, pump, refine, and distribute this stuff. They should be free to sell it as they see fit. If you haven’t invested your own money in helping develop coal-to-gas then you have answered your own question.