Oakland From A Distance – In the ongoing debate against and legal challenges to the Insight Terminal Solutions Oakland Bulk and Oversized Terminal, there are two one constant refrains heard. One is that the Oakland Bulk and Oversized Terminal (where Insight Terminal Solutions is a Zennie62Media content client) is a coal terminal, when it’s not, and is designed to be a true bulk terminal that can facilitate the transport of commodities like iron ore and coal. The other is that coal can be replaced by renewables, and indeed, will be – so why bother maintaining a coal industry at all (as if it will just go away)?
The first question has been addressed so many times that those who once called the Oakland Bulk and Oversized Terminal a “coal terminal” have now stopped doing so. For the second question, I decided to go right to the people who would best know the answer to it: coal miners.
To that end, I joined the Facebook Group Coal Mining 101, which has 12,800 members, and entered this YouTube video post from Oakland News Now:
What did the coal miners write? Well, without revealing names, here are the entries:
1. What a big ol load of bullshit.
2. Yes it can. If they like black outs.
3. Can one make steel from renewable?
4. Well turn your power off !!!
5. You can’t melt steel without coal. Steel that builds our cars, military, sky scrappers. You people are crazy.
6. Worked in a forge plant…any electricity will melt steel…coal in steel is like flour in a biscuit…part of the recipe.
7. No substitute for coking coal .. worked it for years…all that is left here.
8. Windmills. Takes a lot of steel and coal to make one.
9. Wonder why CA is having major blackouts. They shut down their coal fired powerplants in 95 but yet bought electricity off of New Mexico
10. Screw California the whole west coast fall off the US. Wonder of the Demonrats can swim.
11. Stop sending coal power to California
12. One day these tree huggers will regret their decisions to go away from coal! It made us the superpower we are today!
13. It will take one good winter which we haven’t had in a while and theyl turn a certain grid off to keep their cities burning but rural will be without and then they’ll say well coal wasn’t so bad after all. 6 years ago AEP in Eastern, KY came 4 kilowatts of loosing their power grid during the bug snow we had. It will happen and they’ll be sorry
14. Hi I would want to ask this way: Why do you want to do away with coal?
15. If you don’t need coal. Then turn your ELC and see how much you miss it. Then think about all the work that goes into being able to warm your coffee up in the morning. Trust me u really need coal miners and COAL.
16. They are full of crap.
17. I suppose we could burn our forest up in power plants that way between that and burning down our cities we could look just like West Africa.
18. Do they know about products made from coal?
19. Make up from coal steel electricy computer components gas desiel plastic carbon fiber cement home and unlike gas it heats whey longer whit just as btu’s
Overall, the sentiment is that those in Oakland who believe that renewables can replace coal just don’t understand the basics of electric power produced from coal. America’s Power, the coal industry lobby, asked “What would it look like if we actually replaced Indiana’s coal generation with renewable generation in 2018?” and determined that it could not be done.
In 2015 Wharton asked “Can the World Run on Renewable Energy?” Then, it struggles to provide a convincing argument that resoundingly says “Yes!” The Wharton Report says “The global picture is complex. Although coal production internationally is still increasing robustly, and the International Energy Agency sees demand growth of 2.1% annually through 2019,employment — at seven million jobs worldwide — has seen some losses.” And then it gives in and admits that “China’s reliance on coal remains a formidable obstacle. Coal produces 70% of China’s energy, and almost four billion tons were burned there in 2012 — a major reason that China has become the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter. From 2005 to 2011, China (with vast natural coal reserves) added the equivalent of two 600-megawatt plants every week, and from 2010 through 2013, it added coal plants roughly equal to half of all U.S. generation. (At the same time, China is committed to renewable energy — with hydropower included, it’s already at 20%, compared to 13% in the U.S. But demand is rising and so is production: China is planning to double its power-generating capacity by 2030.)”
The truth is that China’s trend is toward a mix of energy production types, and is working to make energy derived from coal use “cleaner”. Indeed, it must be asserted that China and Japan are far ahead of the United States in advancements in coal industry technology with respect to climate change.
My question is this: why can’t America establish a top-priority plan to make traditional energy cleaner and not throw coal miners out of their jobs, with empty promises of employment in industries damaged by The Pandemic? It’s a question that deserves an answer.
Another question that deserves an answer is this: when will Oakland climate change activists start actually reading The Limits To Growth and the research that points to population growth as the real cause of climate change?
Indeed, Population Matters, the UK-based charity which campaigns to achieve a sustainable human population, to protect the natural world and improve people’s lives, reports:
The effects of global warming are already bringing harm to human communities and the natural world. Further temperature rises will have a devastating impact and more action on greenhouse gas emissions is urgently required. Population and climate change are inextricably linked. Every additional person increases carbon emissions — the rich far more than the poor — and increases the number of climate change victims – the poor far more than the rich.
Stay tuned.