UN’s #1 Global Warming Spokesman Has No Training in Climatology.
NYC Mayor Bloomberg: 'Coal is a dead man walking'
Global Warming on Free Republic
Posted on 02/28/2013 9:33:39 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Wednesday that the United States’ coal industry’s days are numbered.
“Even though the coal industry doesn’t totally know it yet or is ready to admit it, its day is done. … Here in the U.S., I’m happy to say, the king is dead. Coal is a dead man walking,” Bloomberg said at the Advanced Research Projects Agency — Energy (ARPA-E) Energy Innovation Summit near Washington, D.C.
Bloomberg has been a vocal advocate for killing coal-fired power. He said health problems from pollution and climate change-exacerbated events like Hurricane Sandy have fomented growing recognition that coal “doesn’t deserve” its reputation as a cheap energy source.
For now, coal is still the leading supplier of electricity. It accounted for 37.4 percent of the nation's electricity mix last year, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration statistics released Tuesday.
But that figure also represented a 12.5 percent drop from the previous year. Natural gas, on the other hand, spiked 21.4 percent to provide 30.4 percent of the nation's power.
Bloomberg attributed coal's struggles to the Environmental Protection Agency's regulations to curb emissions in the name of public health, grassroots environmental efforts and low natural-gas prices.
But Bloomberg noted the U.S. still has a long way to go to achieve “the sustainable future that we all want.”
Coal-fired power plants still account for 40 percent of the nation’s carbon emissions, he noted. And while one-sixth of those facilities are slated for retirement, he said that still leaves a majority standing.
Imposing emissions rules on existing coal-fired plants could be one way to shutter more coal-fired generation, which green groups are pushing Obama to do.
Bloomberg said public health-advocates and those concerned about climate change are ready for a long "regulatory trench war" regarding coal-fired power.
Industry and congressional Republicans, however, have pushed back against many of the EPA emissions regulations. They say the rules are economically burdensome, and have accused the White House of targeting the coal industry.
While industry and many Republicans have fought to protect coal-fired power, Bloomberg has had his hands in many areas in an attempt to end it.
Bloomberg Philanthropies awarded a $50 million grant to Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign, which aims to retire one-third of the nation’s coal-fired fleet by 2020.
Bloomberg Philanthropies also gave a $6-million grant to the Environmental Defense Fund to work on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, regulations.
The process injects a high-pressure mixture of water, sand and chemicals into tight-rock formations to unlock oil-and-gas deposits deep underground. Green groups are concerned the practice could contaminate drinking water, while industry contends it’s safe.
Bloomberg, who touted natural gas’ lower carbon content compared with coal, said companies should work with environmental groups to design regulations with which they can live.
UN’s #1 Global Warming Spokesman Has No Training in Climatology.
NYC Mayor Bloomberg: 'Coal is a dead man walking'
Global Warming on Free Republic
UN’s #1 Global Warming Spokesman Has No Training in Climatology.
NYC Mayor Bloomberg: 'Coal is a dead man walking'
Global Warming on Free Republic
That @$$hole is into everything! #meddling
Nanny State PING!
That @$$hole is into everything! #meddling
Nanny State PING!
I'd like to return the favor.
They got coal in NYC?
There’s nothing wrong with little mikey that a good funeral wouldn’t fix.
“Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government says RWE AG (RWE)’s new power plant that can supply 3.4 million homes aids her plan to exit nuclear energy and switch to cleaner forms of generation. It’s fired with coal.”
“Germany’s increasing coal consumption is part of a global return to the fossil fuel that’s cheaper than most alternatives. The amount of coal burned worldwide rose 5.4 percent to account for 30 percent of total energy use last year, the highest proportion since 1969, according to BP Plc (BP/) data.”
Hmph. First no cigarettes, then no soda, and now he wants the city to go dark.
Yeah cause solar power (lol) will solve all of our energy needs. And windmills.
Bonaparte would be insulted.
New Yawk doesn't need coal! Mikey said so! Let'em try solar and wind.
Nanny knows best.
From the Doomberg Diaries:
“Why won’t they listen to me. Why do they ridicule me. Just because I’m only 5’5”. I’ll show them. I’ll ban every stinkin’ weapon including slingshots. I’ll ban 32 oz sodas, maybe even 12 oz sodas. Styrofoam cups? They are gone baby. Then I’ll be the one who’ll be laughing. Ha! Take that peasants.”
The U.S. is reducing coal burning due to oilfield fracking (cheap natural gas), but Europe has increased its purchases of U.S. coal by 73% in 2012, and will buy more from the U.S. in 2013 and beyond because they closed nuclear plants in Germany and can’t pay Putin’s prices for Russian natural gas (no fracking, no competition...so higher prices there than here).
Here are a couple of recent articles about this topic around the world.
Can thorium become the shale fracking of atomic energy?
Research and Markets: Thorium-based Reactors - A New Lease of Life for Nuclear Power Development
India keen on thorium-based reactors
Our green weenies will fight this tooth and nail, placing us behind the world even as we have more total fossil fuel available than anywhere else.
‘Coal is a dead man walking’
So is our economy thanks to turds like this.
I guess he hasn’t been in the paper enough recently.
The U. S. has MORE than 175 years of proved, recoverable natural gas, right now! With more and more being found on an almost daily basis. Natural gas has become a virtual limitless energy source due to the ability to exploit it through Hydraulic Fracturing.
The reserves for Oil in North America exceed 250 years. Also more is found daily. That does not include the recoverable oil that lurks below the ocean floor on the continental shelf.
Ever since Drake drilled the first oil well in Titusville, PA we have heard about the end of oil and ‘fossil fuel’ Don't you believe it. We are a nation and a World economy built on oil, natural gas, and coal and will continue to be for at least the next hundred years and probably for many more centuries beyond. . http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertbradley/2011/12/27/americas-massive-energy-potential-awaits-mr-president/
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