[Wonder Warthog]

"The United States is the Saudi Arabia of coal. We have more coal than anyone and the rest of the world uses coal."

I think proven reserves show that the USA is also the "Saudi Arabia" of "unconventional" oil and natural gas.

Up until the presidency of the second worst president in US history, the USA was well on the way to converting from coal to natural gas. But James Earl got government to stifle the effort because we were "running out of natural gas". THAT situation has now reversed, given horizontal drilling.

Nat gas is simply a superior fuel (AND chemical feedstock). Coal is simply dirty, difficult to extract, and difficult to use compared to NG.

[Joe Boucher]

All true, but the EPA is closing our coal plants without replacing their output
If you look at china and India they are building new coal plants
Natural gas is better but Not having cheap energy spells doom