Coal's promise September 20, 2007 By Kraig R. Naasz - As nations…

Coal's promise
September 20, 2007

By Kraig R. Naasz - As nations around the world compete with renewed vigor to
find reliable supplies of energy for their growing economies, critics in the United
States are competing to see who can find the most fault with our most abundant
and affordable source of energy: coal.

The tragic mining accident in Utah and the demands for greenhouse-gas
reductions from power plants have fed a gathering storm of misinformation and
misunderstanding, partly fueled by the coal industry's own missteps. Before
policy-makers allow these winds to blow the country off its course toward
stronger economic security and greater energy independence, it is time to pause
and take stock.

America's coal reserves are the world's largest, containing more energy than all
the oil in the Middle East and generating half of the nation's electricity. And while
coal will never be mentioned in the same breath as our purple mountains'
majesty or our amber waves of grain, America's enormous coal supply remains a
strategic natural resource whose value in the digital age can be as great as it
was in the industrial age.

In many ways, the American coal industry has embarked on a journey, but is only
part way to its destination. It has set a course toward safer mines that return
each miner home at the end of each shift and toward low-emissions power plants
fueled by coal. The industry is drawing closer to building a new domestic fuel
industry that converts coal to clean diesel fuel and can help offset the nation's
growing dependence on foreign energy.

For each of these goals, enabling technologies are not yet in reach, but all are
within sight. For example, recent mining accidents spotlighted the absence of
two-way communications devices that could help locate miners trapped
underground. At a time when cell phones connect people across the country,
many wonder why miners can't communicate underground. But communicating
through the air is easier than signaling through hundreds of feet of rock and
earth.

The industry supported changes in mine safety laws last year that require the use
of ground-penetrating communications devices when they become commercially
available, and its work with the National Institute of Occupational Safety and
Health will hopefully speed the development of this technology. Still, changing
the laws in Congress is easier than changing the laws of physics. Until we can
reliably send signals through the earth, the industry is strengthening its hardwired
underground systems to better withstand the force of fire and explosions.

Promising technology is also the key to clean-coal combustion. A full range of
clean coal technologies, from gasification to sulfur -capturing scrubbers, is having
a similarly dramatic impact on electricity generation that micro-processors had on
computing. Power plants built today emit 90 percent fewer emissions than plants
they typically replace from the 1970s. In fact, since 1980, clean-coal technologies
have cut power-plant emissions by 40 percent -- despite a 71 percent increase
in coal-power generation -- and promise steeper reductions in the near future.

Nowhere does the promise of technology loom larger than in capturing and
storing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases suspected of warming the
atmosphere. The coal industry has committed major funding to FutureGen, the
nation's first zero-emissions power plant capable of CO2 capture and storage.

At the same time, technology perfected in South Africa can convert some of
America's 250-year supply of coal to clean transportation fuels. With our growing
reliance on imported energy from volatile oil-rich regions of the world, and
powerful international rivals bidding for the same foreign energy, a domestic coal-
to-liquids fuel industry will help us remain secure and continue to grow.

This enormous potential of U.S. coal underscores the urgency of developing
technologies capable of capturing and storing greenhouse gases. Fortunately,
technological innovation is also America's strength. Ten years ago, few would
have predicted the value of goods traded on something called Ebay would equal
the GDP of Kenya, or that a company called Yahoo would attract 380 million
users daily to a "Web browser."

This same ingenuity can give coal new life. That's good news for a nation whose
appetite for energy is ever increasing, because the availability of affordable
energy to satisfy that appetite is not. Unquestionably, Americans will need more
alternative fuels, from solar and wind to biofuels.We need natural gas and
nuclear power, too.

But energy experts, knowing the inherent limitations of other sources, urge us not
to forget coal. From the Environmental Protection Agency to the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, the outlook is the same: Coal will remain the mainstay of
American power for years to come.

That's why the challenge is not how to reduce coal's use.It's to use technology to
make coal our smartest as well as our most affordable and abundant energy
choice.

Kraig R. Naasz is president and CEO of the National Mining Association.