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The Declining Power of Coal – May 2009 numbers released

Friday, August 14th, 2009

The coal industry and their associated front groups like to claim that coal provides more than half of our electricity. This was once true, but has not been the case for several years. As we’ve reported throughout the year, the importance of coal in our national electricity generation is declining at a pretty remarkable rate. EIA just released their numbers for May 2009, and once again coal is down. The year to date numbers are staggering. From January-May 2009, coal produced just 45.4% of our electricity, and the monthly numbers are getting lower and lower. In the most recent recorded month (May) coal was down to 42.6% of electricity generation.

MayCoalGraph

Big Coal wants us to believe that without burning more and more coal, our economy will shrink and we might even freeze in the dark. But a close look at our energy picture tells a very different story: yes, we still burn a lot of coal, but we can burn less of it all the time while cleaner energy sources that provide even more jobs take its place.

Not only CAN we transition to a clean energy future, but it’s already starting to happen. The reason coal is on the decline – even before carbon regulations – is that it simply can no longer compete with cleaner energy sources like wind power and natural gas. For an encouraging contrast, let’s take a look at the increasing power of wind:

YTDWindGraph

2 Responses to “The Declining Power of Coal – May 2009 numbers released”

  1. Paul Crouser Says:

    Notice the exponential growth rate for wind – without long term price supports in place.

    The DOE released a massive state-of-the-art report that examines every aspect of the wind industry and proposes a plan for getting 20 percent of our energy needs from wind at a trifling $43 billion over anticipated costs without a wind plan!

    The report makes very clear that wind power is competitive right now with traditional sources of power.

    Read the report:
    DOE 20 percent wind report

    peace,
    Paul

  2. richard beckman Says:

    Clean coal is an oxymoron! There is no such thing and even if sequestered it will come back to haunt us in the future.
    Invest in wind, solar and wave technology. China as reported in today’s NYTimes seeks to become a major exporter of solar panels and is going to build factories in this country so they can sell here and qualify for “Buy American”! If this country cannot meet the challenge then let’s hope the Chinese can. We have far too long and allowed coal burning to continue to pollute the atmosphere, the waters and the earth.

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