Coal today may seem of little relevance to many residents of New
York City or other American urban centers. It long ago ceased to
fuel the furnaces of their homes and apartment buildings in
winter.
But long after it disappeared from the uses most visible to city
dwellers, coal is still the critical fuel behind the everyday
functions of their lives. Across the U.S. for more than a century,
coal has remained quietly at work — providing in recent years
nearly half the electricity that lights urban buildings and
streets, keeps air conditioners humming on hot days and energizes
computers and TVs to inform and entertain. Electricity generated
with coal powers the factories that produce all manner of food,
clothing, cars and other goods for Americans everywhere.
Coal maintains that role with good reason. It is America’s most
abundant energy resource; our coal reserves are the world’s
largest, sufficient to last more than 250 years. That abundance
makes coal affordable; over the decades its price has been far more
stable that of another major power generation fuel, natural gas.
And way below costs those promising but still-unproven resources,
solar and wind power.
Meanwhile, science has made coal a much cleaner fuel. Utilities’
use of coal for power generation has jumped more than 180 percent
since 1970 but emissions from those plants have plummeted 75
percent. And the march of technology promises even cleaner
coal in the years ahead.
Apparently, all those facts have escaped the attention of New
York’s Mayor Michael Bloomberg. This month, he marshaled 90 U.S.
mayors behind a campaign of misinformation that could in short
order end the use of coal for power generation — and in doing so
wipe out America’s historic coal industry.
In a letter to the EPA Administrator, Bloomberg and his fellow
mayors expressed strong support for new air quality regulations
that will shut down coal fired power generation on the grounds that
coal is too “dirty” and must immediately be replaced with
generation fueled by natural gas, solar and wind power.
Joining Mayor Bloomberg on the letter were a successor of
mine as Mayor of Cincinnati, Mark Mallory, two other Ohio
mayors (Michael Coleman of Columbus and Bruce Rinker of Mayfield
Village), the senior elected officials of big cities from Atlanta
to Boston Chicago, Denver, Houston and Los Angeles, and the chief
executives of smaller but staunchly “progressive” strongholds such
as Burlington, Vermont, Takoma Park, Maryland, Maui County, Hawaii,
and Decatur, Georgia.
With one stroke of the pen, all wrote off the fuel that has
helped make possible a century of economic growth in their cities.
They accepted the higher electric rates that utility executives say
are certainly on the way as today’s historically low natural gas
prices zoom upward while wind and solar power, for the foreseeable
future, remain very expensive.
The mayors also agreed, in signing that letter, to condemn the
jobs of 555,000 Americans who mine, transport, market and utilize
coal, along with their combined annual income of $36.3 billion.
All of this comes less than a year after Mayor Bloomberg
announced plans to donate $50 million to the Sierra Club to support
its nationwide campaign to eliminate coal-fired power
plants.
On many levels, I have respect and admiration for Mayor
Bloomberg. Elected in the dark days just after the 9/11 terrorist
attacks, he helped rebuild the city both physically and
emotionally. In that and other roles he has followed a course of
pragmatic progressivism, addressing public concerns on issues with
a common-sense approach that recognizes economic realities.
So I am surprised and very disappointed that he would lead his
mayoral colleagues in demonizing a valuable American energy
resource, assuring higher utility bills for Americans still
strapped by a slow economic recovery, and wiping out one of our
oldest industries.
My personal commitment to cleaning up and protecting our
environment runs deep. I’m proud of the progress America has made
these past 40 years from a land of smoggy skylines and dead rivers
to one that is getting cleaner by the day.
But I also understand that our environmental ideals must be
balanced with recognition of our economic challenges, both short-
and long-term. We can’t build a stronger economy and create the
millions of jobs we need if we’re paying sharply higher utility
bills and killing a half million good-paying jobs in the
process.
Numerous polls show that the majority of Americans share that
pragmatism. I thought Michael Bloomberg was among them, until I saw
that letter to the EPA Administrator.
