Good news from India

They are recognizing coal as the fantastic energy source that it is - from Yahoo/Reuters:

India douses century-old coal fires as Modi seeks output boost
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is determined to move more than 100,000 people living near coalfields in eastern India to new homes, making it easier to douse underground fires that have burned for a century and mine huge reserves of premium coal.

Reviving output from India's nationalized coal sector has been one of Modi's most tangible achievements during his first year in office, one that he hopes will secure continuous power to all and eat into an annual coal import bill of $15 billion.

The burning deposits of Jharia, in Jharkhand state, are particularly prized because they are the only source of top quality steelmaking coal in the country. India spends $4 billion a year on importing that grade alone.

Modi traveled to Jharkhand in February and urged the chief minister to speed up work on putting out the fires and shifting the people living there.

"The fact that the prime minister is directly involved shows that the government is very serious about it," Coal Secretary Anil Swarup said in New Delhi. "It's a huge task but the good news is that we have started moving in the right direction."

For some of the thousands living in run-down settlements around the coal deposits, the urgency is clear.

Shakili Devi, 60, has lost count of the number of huts she inhabited over the years that caved in because of intense heat and shifting ground around her.

What the greens fail to admit is that cheap and clean energy will lift people like Ms. Devi out of poverty. The rising tide floats all boats.

The "dirty coal" talking point is failing as people aren't seeing it - you can stand beside a one hundred car coal train and not see any dust coming from it. Two years ago when we were driving to the blacksmithing conference in South Dakota, we visited three coal mines - no dust.

Now, the anti-energy/anti-progress people are claiming that burning coal releases huge amounts of mercury and other toxins into the atmosphere. Those talking points were valid with the older plants but technology marches forward and the new plants (and retrofitted older plants) have very low emissions. A good writeup on this can be found here:

The Facts About Air Quality and Coal-Fired Power Plants
Coal-fired electricity generation is far cleaner today than ever before. The popular misconception that our air quality is getting worse is wrong, as shown by EPA’s air quality data. Modern coal plants, and those retrofitted with modern technologies to reduce pollution, are a success story and are currently providing about 50% of our electricity. Undoubtedly, pollution emissions from coal-fired power plants will continue to fall as technology improves.

Much more at the site - lots of links to source materials for verification. Coal is cheap, clean (when processed correctly) and abundant - the USA has about 500 years of known reserves.

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This page contains a single entry by DaveH published on May 31, 2015 12:14 PM.

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