A federal order to keep coal and nuclear plants from retiring could reshape government's relationship with the power sector, regulators and analysts say. https://www.utilitydive.com/news/ho...l-directive-would-upend-power-markets/524906/
Another fake news story pushed by the left. Pure cost basis, coal is probably very close to natural gas, both being abundant and both being fossil. Renewables are not cheaper per se.... after the federal subsidies, they may be cheaper under certain circumstances... without the federal aids they are always more expensive than fossil. The previous obama admin has done too much harm in artificially pushing the renewables, which are nothing but federal aid grabs..... Trump can't reverse all the federal program yet. So for now it makes sense to help the coal to get back on its feet, after it was almost left to die under obama. Nuclear - I don't have the details. It's also funny that the socialist left putting the soviet label on Trump.
You are dreaming if you think that coal can compete with other energy source when it comes to generating electricity. One coal plant per week is retired in the USA, and replaced mostly by a natural gas plant, or much less frequently, a solar or wind plant. No power company or executive in his right mind would consider building a new coal-fired plant. Not only is natural gas cheaper, power companies also have to worry about future changes to carbon emission laws -- coal is always the dirties fuel, and so called "clean coal" is a cruel joke. There isn't a single clean coal power plant operating anywhere in the world, and the only company that was trying to build one never completed it, and recently petitioned the government to change the plant to use natural gas.
yes NG looks promising... removing the obama regulation strangle hold should help coal. Whether it can get back to the glory in the past, we will see. Carbon emission laws - NG has carbon too. Also, perhaps no future carbon laws will be put in place at all. More people are realizing that carbon is just a scam for federal aid and global power grab.
Coal has a cost in lives of course not associated with NG. Some may be made ill by gas leaks but black lung disease is a wide spread killer. "In 2013 CWP resulted in 25,000 deaths down from 29,000 deaths in 1990" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalworker's_pneumoconiosis
As a former electric utility economist (and focused on system planning/operations) (AND as a lifelong Republican, as if that matters in the least bit), you're out of your mind.
Let's be perfectly clear here, renewables absent the hydro that's been around since the 1930s produces less than 10% of U.S. power (https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3). Coal and nuclear plants are going out of business because they're more expensive than gas. Full stop. The specific FirstEnergy plants that precipitated this particular bit of communism by Trump are going out of business because they didn't clear the PJM and NEPOOL capacity markets. Which of course you know aren't even generally open to renewables because they can't provide firm capacity. You do know how capacity markets work, yes, and locational marginal pricing, and the role of the ISOs, before you run to Wikipedia them right now? Because surely you wouldn't just talking out your ass about something you know fuck all about, although the internal contradictions in your statement would point strongly toward that? The real question is why someone who ostensibly believes in capitalism and markets, that's talking to you @dozu888, would believe that nationalizing power producers and setting price controls on what is now one of the most robust free markets in the country in PJM and ISO-NE could ever be a good thing!!! Nationalizing companies is what communists do when they take over a country, you're aware of than no? To paraphrase @tommcginnis, have you lost your mind? BTW, Utility Dive is the industry publication for the electric utility industry. It is about as dry and non-political as you get and generally only of interest to those of us in the utility industry. To accuse it of publishing a "fake news story pushed by the left" is the height of absurdity and highlights a remarkable level of ignorance on your part. You should have just posted your last line "I don't have the details" and then did some research. That's how most intelligent people operate when forming an opinion on something they know little about.
The original article has too few details. Free market is fine, except coal was handicapped under obama, so a little assistance to get it back on its feet appears reasonable.
Handicapped how? A combined cycle natural gas plant now produces power at a lower cost than any coal plant ever has, even when they were allowed to kill thousands polluting the air and destroy both our natural environment and our cities with acid rain (which you must support, screw the environment and those sickly bastards with athsma anyway, right?). Which by the way was curtailed long before Obama, who actually quite disappointingly to me was unable to impliment any meaningful restrictions on coal plants (but of course you know that being an expert in this market and not just someone who heard from someone Obama bad, war on coal, MAGA!). Coal and nuclear plants are shutting down because they lost in the free market. Full stop. Why exactly does coal deserve anything, let alone a bailout from our precious tax dollars and more expensive electricity for all of us if it's both more expensive and dirtier than the natural gas that's replacing it? You appear to be completely against every tenent of free markets in this case, you're actually supporting nationalizing an industry for christ sake, based on pretty much zero understanding of how that industry works! Again, have you lost your mind? Don't you see how you're reflexively supporting something that has absolutely no redeeming qualities and is actually the opposite of all you allege you believe in simply because your tribe tells you that you should? How does that not bother you?