Carl Pope says:
- Abundant, cheap fossil-fuel energy – that created the modern consumer economies of the U.S., Europe, Russia, Australia and Japan – is not viable in the 21st century due to cost.
- Coal is geologically more abundant than oil, but cheap coal, close to population centers, is not. Powder River Basin coal costs $12 a ton to mine and $60 a ton to ship, Inner Mongolia coal costs $25 a ton to mine but rises to more than $125 a ton at its destination.
- Shipping coal is more difficult and more expensive than shipping oil.
- India and China have some of the world’s largest coal reserves and are the fastest-growing global coal markets. But most of their coal is distant from their booming coastal regions. For China and India, coal at $120 a ton is now considered cheap.
- Indonesia will impose a tax on coal exports, leading to an actual ban in 2014, creating a power crisis for China and India.
- Oil is too expensive to power Asia’s growing electricity demand.
Read the full article at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-19/cheap-coal-is-dead-long-live-renewables-part-1-.html