Peak Oil is You
Donate Bitcoins ;-) or Paypal :-)
Page added on October 4, 2013
Coal miners suffer as U.S. production of natural gas increases
Anyone old enough to remember the gas lines of the 1970s during the Arab oil embargo might be surprised by the Wall Street Journal report which says the U.S. has overtaken Russia as the number one producer of oil and natural gas.
But the increase in natural gas production has had a devastating impact in coal country.
For more than a 100 years, Harlan County, Ky., has been fueled, fed and funded by coal.
In the past two years, unemployment has gone from 9.8 percent to 17.2 percent. In eastern Kentucky overall, 42 percent of miners have lost their jobs.
Scott Duncan is one of them.
“It’s been rough trying to figure out how to pay your bills, take care of your kids, just how you’re going to make it,” he says.
Duncan worked in mining for 18 years. He and his wife Charity have three teenagers. He was making $80,000 a year, but now his family is on food stamps.
“Drastic change, I mean, I don’t know how to talk about it, it’s just unreal” he says.
“Our vehicle is 10 years old, it’s payed for, and we pawned the title to the Jeep for $250 so we could buy some groceries,” Charity says. “That lasted about three days.”
The downturn in eastern Kentucky’s coal fortunes has been fueled, in part, by the boom in U.S. natural gas production and new federal limits on greenhouse gases.
The only mines still operating in Harlan are run by C.V. Bennett’s family. Five years ago, Bennett had 500 employees. Today it’s 100.
“Coal miners are family, they’re an extended family,” he says. “You kind of feel like you got an obligation to keep them working.”
But Bennett says he can’t do that.
Charity says she doesn’t see coal mining coming back.
“I wish I did, but I just don’t think so,” she says.
After we spoke with the Duncans, Scott told us just Wednesday he received a new job offer. It is 400 miles away.
4 Comments on "Coal miners suffer as U.S. production of natural gas increases"
rockman on Fri, 4th Oct 2013 12:20 pm
No doubt some coal mining companies are hurting for a variety of reasons. Certainly coal miners have never had an easy life. Many have had to deal with terrible work and health conditions. But as a whole the industry isn’t “suffering” despite all the hype to that effect. Not my opinion but just simple facts that are out there if one looks for them. The web is also a plentiful mine. US coal production has been steadily increasing for the last 40 years. In 2008 the industry dug more coal out of the ground since the beginning of operations in this country. In the last few years production has slipped a small amount…but we’re still producing more coal than just a short time ago. And coal industry revenue, even adjusted for inflation, has been hitting historical highs for some time until the recent slip.
And more of the recent profits have come from exporting coal. The US is now the 4th largest coal exporter on the planet. US coal exports to China have increased 500% in recent years. In fact, the coal industry is the victim of their own success: they’ve put so much coal into the market place they’ve driven prices down about 17%. As a result less economic operations have been scaled back. But for the US, with the largest proven coal reserves on the planet, the industry is well prepared to keep supplying the world as oil/NG become less affordable. US oil production peaked in 1971. Global oil production may be at or close to its peak. US coal production did not peak until 2008 and appears very capable of increasing significantly when demand increases. Oil/NG production is passing from its glory days…coal is just beginning its IMHO.
And yes: the percent of US electricity production from coal-fired facilities has decreased in the last 10 years thanks to more utilization of NG. Very misplaced optimism IMHO. What isn’t pointed out is that the number of coal-fired units have increased significantly in the last 10 years as well as the volume of coal used to make e-. One last point: coal produces more than 1/3 of the e- generated on the planet. The next biggest source is NG…producing less than half the amount of e- as coal.
Unfortunately the Bennett family is facing hard times. Been there a couple of times myself so it’s easy to be sympathetic towards them. But the coal industry isn’t facing hard times by any stretch of the imagination. It’s a booming global business with a bright future ahead of it IMHO.
Kenz300 on Fri, 4th Oct 2013 1:45 pm
If the world is to have any hope of dealing with climate change it needs to stop building any more coal fired power plants and begin shutting down the oldest ones.
Fossil fuels have been polluting our air, water and land for too long.
GregT on Fri, 4th Oct 2013 6:06 pm
Kenz,
It is believed that switching from coal fired power plants, to natural gas power plants may actually accelerate climate change.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=switching-to-natural-gas-power
Natural gas is also not the solution, as is no alternate electric power generation source, that relies on fossil fuels in it’s resource extraction, manufacturing, construction, installation, maintenance, or replacement.
We need to rethink our relationship with our host planet. Excess energy is not the answer to our problems. It IS the problem.
James on Sat, 5th Oct 2013 11:51 pm
Forestry will be the mainstay for the unemployed coal miners. They will become involved in growing trees and harvesting them for keeping people warm. All of the forestry practices will revert back using human/animal power to steer logs down logging trails. The replanting of trees, caring for them, disease/fire prevention will be done at a much slower pace. Fire towers will be rebuilt since aircraft will be prohibitively expensive. All of these activities along with the agrarian lifestyle will allow these unemployed miners to become employed again for the long term.