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The American Conservative: Coal Cronyism – Wall Street writes a policy; Trump sells it to Appalachia as an elixir
(Before It's News)
I have family that comes from very near coal country. Times have been tough there. But Obama was only part of the problem. Natural gas is just a much better alternative to coal. The market has made this determination. Thanks to the fracking revolution we have plentiful (and much cleaner) natural gas.
Reviving coal artificially (which likely won’t happen anyway) is not smart.
(From The American Conservative)
President Trump’s Wednesday evisceration of President Obama’s Social Cost of Carbon regulations deserves praise. Those regulations were harmful and arbitrary. Likewise, Trump should be praised for doing away with Obama’s ridiculous Surface Mining Stream Protection Rule.
But Trump is overselling hard-working West Virginians on his ability to save the coal industry. The truth is that Appalachian coal is in terminal decline. Deregulation and halting big-government green misadventures, both good things, will certainly lessen the magnitude of the industry’s decline, but not the directionality. Automation, resource depletion, competition from Western coal mining, and the natural-gas fracking revolution—one of the industries Trump champions—will kill Appalachian coal regardless of regulations.
http://www.againstcronycapitalism.org/
Source: http://www.againstcronycapitalism.org/2017/04/the-american-conservative-coal-cronyism-wall-street-writes-a-policy-trump-sells-it-to-appalachia-as-an-elixir/
