U.S. Coal Use Falling Fast

[Parsad]

Pretty good article on coal and natural gas.  Cheers!

 

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-coal-falling-fast-utilities-173126367.html;_ylt=ApfrbpNwLdeD17Ez3mWyB7SiuYdG;_ylu=X3oDMTQ0NGVlZXRqBG1pdANGaW5hbmNlIEZQIFRvcCBTdG9yeSBSaWdodARwa2cDZWFhMzA4M2UtNGYzOC0zNzk4LWFjMTctM2MxZDcxZjdjMzk0BHBvcwMzBHNlYwN0b3Bfc3RvcnkEdmVyAzdiZjAzOWMwLWI0Y2EtMTFlMS1iZjlhLWZjNDRlOTI3M2M4Mg--;_ylg=X3oDMTFpNzk0NjhtBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi11cwRwc3RhaWQDBHBzdGNhdANob21lBHB0A3NlY3Rpb25z;_ylv=3

[Uccmal]

Interesting article Sanjeev,  I was thinking of linking it to the Apple thread as an illustration of how fast things can change, in a ten thousand year old industry.... :-X

 

[prunes]

In another thread one board member talked about the merits of buying coal companies due to long term contracts in place. How much of a risk is companies walking away from contracts? I think I saw articles about some firms in China doing so.

 

Conversely, I also saw an article in today's FT about Indonesia looking to build coal power plants.

[Parsad]

Interesting article Sanjeev,  I was thinking of linking it to the Apple thread as an illustration of how fast things can change, in a ten thousand year old industry.... :-X

 

Al, I'll bet you $5K that coal will still be terrific 100 years from now for barbecuing!  It won't matter...ribs will still taste good, even if there are other ways of cooking them.  That competitive advantage will never dissipate even if GE comes up with a better way to nuke food.  ;D 

 

Are you man enough to take my bet?  I'll let you and Ericopoly go halfsies on that offer, because I know neither one of you are man enough to take me on alone.  Heck, add Stone19 to the list too, because I've had pulled pork on his Green Egg and he uses two types of wood along with his special Green Egg coal.  He won't use normal coal by itself!  ;D 

 

And he uses those sissy Carolina BBQ sauces too...no tomato base!  Now Matt and Joe are probably gonna jump on me, because they're from North Carolina and they're used to those sauces...any way, I digress...back to coal being the energy source of the future and natural gas will never replace it...just never will happen and I've got $5K riding on it...because as we all know, objects moving in a straight line will never, ever deviate, will they?  Cheers!

 

 

[Parsad]

In another thread one board member talked about the merits of buying coal companies due to long term contracts in place. How much of a risk is companies walking away from contracts? I think I saw articles about some firms in China doing so.

 

Conversely, I also saw an article in today's FT about Indonesia looking to build coal power plants.

 

Hi Prunes, I think it is highly dependent on which regions we are talking about.  For example, liquified natural gas is cheap and abundant in North America, whereas it is far more expensive than coal in many other parts of the world, such as Eastern Europe & Asia. 

 

So, I don't think coal use would decrease much in those regions, but you could see some users walk away from long-term contracts in North America if you get a prolonged slump in natural gas prices.  In general, the world will continue to have a voracious appetite for energy, and it won't matter exactly what the source is...but the percentage from any particular source will be heavily dependent on supply/demand and there will be some regionality influencing that curve.  Cheers!

[Liberty]

If only for environmental reasons, I'll be glad when coal is mostly gone.

[jeffmori7]

Liberty, the day we will consider the carbon cost, we have a chance to finally get rid of coal. This day people will stop making themselves believe coal is cheap.

[Liberty]

Liberty, the day we will consider the carbon cost, we have a chance to finally get rid of coal. This day people will stop making themselves believe coal is cheap.

 

Indeed. And it is also having a huge health/quality-of-life costs in places like China where the air can be extremely foul mostly because fo it.

[ERICOPOLY]

Interesting article Sanjeev,  I was thinking of linking it to the Apple thread as an illustration of how fast things can change, in a ten thousand year old industry.... :-X

 

Al, I'll bet you $5K that coal will still be terrific 100 years from now for barbecuing!  It won't matter...ribs will still taste good, even if there are other ways of cooking them.  That competitive advantage will never dissipate even if GE comes up with a better way to nuke food.  ;D 

 

Are you man enough to take my bet?  I'll let you and Ericopoly go halfsies on that offer, because I know neither one of you are man enough to take me on alone.  Heck, add Stone19 to the list too, because I've had pulled pork on his Green Egg and he uses two types of wood along with his special Green Egg coal.  He won't use normal coal by itself!  ;D 

 

And he uses those sissy Carolina BBQ sauces too...no tomato base!  Now Matt and Joe are probably gonna jump on me, because they're from North Carolina and they're used to those sauces...any way, I digress...back to coal being the energy source of the future and natural gas will never replace it...just never will happen and I've got $5K riding on it...because as we all know, objects moving in a straight line will never, ever deviate, will they?  Cheers!

 

 

 

I too have a Big Green Egg.  It doesn't get as much use these days for two reasons:

1)  I'm still stuck in the Seattle region and, yes, it was Winter once again today!.

2)  I tried to cut meat out of my diet.  I will make pulled pork again this year, but only a couple of times.

 

I will experiment with roasted veggies.  Nine more days until I'm burning rubber out of my driveway headed for Santa Barbara.