Quote:
Originally Posted by accord1999
Yet coal, in its weakened state in the US still produces far more electricity.
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/mont...cfm?t=epmt_1_1
Which is why despite all the "fake news" about how cheap solar and wind is, their inherent high costs and lack of reliability will ensure they never produce a significant amount of energy in a large, developed country, as the failure of Germany's Energiewende has already proven. |
What a disingenuous post. The reality is that coal use for power production reached its peak under Reagan and has been in decline since the late 80s. It has gone from the most widely used source of electricity generation (60%) to a close second to natural gas (32%). The only reason coal is still a leader is because it takes time to spin up new generation facilities and retire the old ones. Also, you don't make systemic changes overnight. Moving to a more sustainable energy economy takes time and commitment. It also takes political will.
Frankly, this post comes off as a defense by someone in the fossil fuel lobby. Why is it that you ignore the reality the nation and the planet faces, and just suggest we continue to plow along with the very thing that is killing us? I also don't buy the garbage the line that we cannot develop a sustainable power grid through the use of green and nuclear technology. We have not even made a dent in penetration with solar technology or wind technology. We have not leveraged cheap hydro. We have no explored the use of tidal to any great degree. And we have not even begun to push for new nuclear power generation. The reality is we have to get off fossil fuels, and coal is the first one we need to stop using.