Date: 10-15-2017
Coal-dependant Kentucky and Indiana are in the crosshairs; Billionaire Bloomberg sends $millions to environmental groups to fight against coal…
The two New York City billionaires are battling it out over coal. And coal-dependant Kentucky and Indiana are in the crosshairs. The moves come as Kentucky, once the third ranked coal-producing state, has fallen to fifth behind Wyoming, West Virginia, Illinois and Pennsylvania, according to the latest numbers from the government.
Indiana ranks 7th. After President Donald Trump’s top environmental official came to Kentucky to announce that he intended to ditch the nation’s first crackdown on climate pollution from coal-fired power plants, former New York City Mayor and philanthropist Michael Bloomberg responded by sending tens of millions of dollars to environmental groups to fight against coal. Bloomberg Philanthropies said Bloomberg has spent $100 million since 2011 on the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign. It announced it would double down on that effort with another $64 million to the Sierra Club and other organizations fighting against coal and for a cleaner environment.
“The Trump administration has yet to realize that the war on coal was never led by Washington, and Washington cannot end it,” said Bloomberg, in a written statement. “It was started and continues to be led by communities in both red and blue states who are tired of having their air and water poisoned when there are cleaner and cheaper alternatives available, cities and states that are determined to clean their air and reduce their costs, and businesses seeking to lower their energy bills while also doing their part for the climate.”
Counter to mainstream science, Trump has called climate change a hoax.
Former President Obama had argued that “climate change is not a problem for another generation, not anymore.” U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, who joined Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt in eastern Kentucky on Monday, said then he was pleased that “friends of coal” were in the White House.
A subsequent statement provided by his office in response to the Bloomberg announcement said that the Senate Majority Leader supported the president’s efforts to repeal “anti-coal jobs regulation and bring relief to Kentucky’s coal families. “Obama’s regulation sought to close coal plants and threaten jobs of hard-working Kentuckians. It represented a shocking overreach from the Obama EPA and if implemented would have further threatened coal miners, their families, and communities throughout Kentucky that benefits from coal’s reliability and affordability.”
The federal government’s own energy experts, however, have concluded that cheaper natural gas has been the main reason for coal’s recent decline. Bloomberg credited the pressure from environmental groups has helping to close half the nation’s coal-fired power plants over the last six years. “With this new grant, we aim to reach 60 percent by the end of 2020.”
Expect continued community organizing in Kentucky, such as in Owensboro, where nuns, clean-energy advocates, college students and churches are pressing for solar power to help replace coal, said Jodi Perras, who manages the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign in Kentucky, Indiana and Michigan. In Indiana, the Sierra Club will also ramp up community support for cleaner alternatives to coal along the Ohio River, upwind from Louisville, she said.
Other groups to receive funding include Earthjustice, Environmental Defense Fund, League of Conservation Voters and the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Abigail Dillen, vice president of litigation for climate and energy with the environmental law group Earthjustice, said renewed support from Bloomberg will help environmentalist equip themselves with the technical expertise needed to closely scrutinize energy policy and legal matters before public service commissions and judges.
They will be making the case that “you and I should not have to pay more for electricity than we need to,” as coal costs rise and the costs of renewables declines, she said. “It’s really intensive work and you need people who really understand (electricity) to play in these energy proceedings.”
She praised Bloomberg Philanthropies for “having the long view.”
Electric power generation from coal fell by 16 percent in Kentucky between 2007 and 2015, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency. In Indiana, the slide was 37 percent.
In Kentucky, the Beyond Coal campaign put pressure on several coalplants, including LG& E’s decades-old Cane Run power plant in Louisville. It has since closed and was replaced by one burning cleaner natural gas.
The federal agency documented an uptick in coal production from both states over last year – a 12.9 percent increase in Indiana and a 6.4 percent increase in Kentucky.
Coal mining employment statewide in Kentucky, however, has continued to slide, from 6,564 at the end of June in 2016 to 6,364 at the same time this year, according to the most current report from Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet. There were 18,963 mining jobs in 2009, a 65 percent decline, the state report said.
By James Bruggers
The Courier-Journal
