Economically distressed counties in Ohio, North Carolina and Georgia due to loss of coal jobs while coal industry is booming in China and other countries. Trump says he will protect US coal producing states

Map: "County Economic Status in Appalachia, FY 2016," Appalachian Regional Commission,  US gov. data, "(Effective October 1, 2015 through September 30, 2016)"

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  "The Appalachian Regional Commission uses an index-based county economic classification system to identify and monitor the economic status of Appalachian counties. See the methodology for a description of each economic level."

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VP Joe Biden, May 2013: "The Chinese are building something like one new coal-fired plant a week – a week....And they're building them every week, and they've been doing that for the last six or seven years."...

subhead, "You mentioned a carbon tax. Is the Obama administration going to follow the lead of China and propose such a policy?"

5/10/2013, Joe Biden: The Rolling Stone Interview | Politics News | Rolling Stone
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Inaccurate China coal reports:

China 'corrects' coal emissions report in 2015, has been burning up to 17% more coal yearly, meaning a billion tons more emissions than previously reported. Jan. 2015 NY Times article

1/3/2015, "China Burns Much More Coal Than Reported, Complicating Climate Talks," NY Times, Chris Buckley, Beijing (11/4/ print)

"China, the world’s leading emitter of greenhouse gases from coal, has been burning up to 17 percent more coal a year than the government previously disclosed, according to newly released data. The finding could complicate the already difficult efforts to limit global warming. 

Even for a country of China's size, the scale of the correction is immense. The sharp upward revision in official figures means that China has released much more carbon dioxide — almost a billion more tons a year according to initial calculations — than previously estimated....This is not the first time China has underestimated its coal consumption. In the late 1990s, small coal mines were ordered to close, but many of them simply stopped reporting their output to the government. For a time, this created an erroneous impression that China had succeeded in generating economic growth without increasing emissions."...

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China leads world in CO2 emissions from fossil fuel, Dec. 2014 report:

 











   
Page 14, chart above, CO2 emissions from fossil fuel:

China emitted almost one third of global total in 2013, 10.3 billion tons, more than US and EU combined.

Dec. 2014, "Trends in global CO2 emissions 2014 Report," PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, EU Commission Joint Research Centre.

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Jan. 2014, China coal use:

1/27/2014, "China’s Growing Coal Use Is World’s Growing Problem," ClimateCentral.org, Eric Larson 















 

image from Climate Central

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6/4/2012, “Climate change stunner: USA leads world in CO2 cuts since 2006,” Vancouver Observer, Saxifrage 



“Not only that, but as my top chart shows, US CO2 emissions are falling even faster than what President Obama pledged in the global Copenhagen Accord."…  
 
 

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Nov. 2015 Reuters article: 500 new coal plants in Asia in 2015, 1000 more planned:

11/3/2015, "Natural gas losing its shine as Asia holds faith in coal power," Reuters UK, Florence Tan and Henning Gloystein, Singapore

"While much attention has been given to a potential peak in China's coal demand and worries about emissions, in Asia alone this year power companies are building more than 500 coal fired plants, with at least a thousand more on planning boards. Coal is not only cheaper than natural gas, it is often available locally and has no heavy import costs....

And growth in coal is not only seen in developing economies. Coal's share of the energy mix in Japan, top importer of LNG, will rise to 30 percent by 2030, up from 22 percent in 2010,"...

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3/12/16, "Trump Blames EPA For Ohio’s Struggling Coal And Steel Industry," Daily Caller, Chris Smith

"Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump took aim at the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) regulations targeting Ohio’s coal and steel industry Saturday, calling the agency a disaster. 

 “They are a complete disaster, we are going to change things around,” Trump said at a rally in Dayton, Ohio, ahead of the state’s March 15 primary.

“We have to protect your coal industry which is being decimated” by EPA regulations, he added. “And we have to protect your steel industry.”

Coal mines have been bleeding jobs recently, losing more than 7,500 jobs in the last year alone, according to federal data.

The slow bleed, according to energy insiders, is due primarily to a cornucopia of overarching EPA-administered regulations targeting the coal industry in the Appalachia area.

The increased regulations and rules are a result of efforts made by the Obama administration to get tough on the fossil fuel industry for supposedly contributing to so-called man-made global warming.

A study in April found the coal industry lost 50,000 jobs from 2008 to 2012 due to the regulations, as well as the advent of inexpensive natural gas.

The Appalachia area, which includes large portions of Ohio, has been crippled by natural gas and EPA regulations."...

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Comment: The point is, even if you think CO2 is poisonous, the US isn't the problem, can't possibly be the problem, has reduced its CO2 in any case. China controls global CO2. The US could have zero CO2 and it wouldn't effect global CO2. Is anybody home? All US CO2 government programs should be ended immediately and the tax dollars diverted to the poor and needy.



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