06-01 Understanding
As a boy, I remember my father shovelling coal into a hopper in our basement and putting the ash into a heavy metal drum. There were no recreation rooms in those days. After the war, our family went to Belfast to visit our grandparents and there I got another coal education..Our grandfather went up and…
06-02 China
Just imagine living in a place where you put on a gauze mask leaving your home to protect yourself from the smog and pollutants caused by burning coal.This is what happens in areas of China where coal is used not just to create electricity, but for cooking and heating. In 1985, while touring China, I…
06-03 The US
During the 2016 Election, Trump said he would save the coal industry in the US, but all his machinations to remove environmental protections and stir development have failed. And why? Because in the long-run, technology and economics will always overpower politics. And natural gas, and renewables like solar and wind are cheaper.In fact, when you…
06-04 India
The “Conservative” argument seems to go like this: “Why are we shutting down our coal-powered generating stations when countries like India can’t build coal-fired power plants fast enough?”And the “Liberal” argument is quite different: “Developed nations have prospered using fossil fuels and have a moral imperative to retire their coal-fired power plants to help control…
06-05 Australia
How would it feel as a citizen of Australia to have the small island nations of the Pacific blame Australia’s massive coal industry for the climate change forces that are threatening their future? I am talking about island nations that we heard about during WW2, like the Maldives and the Marshall Islands. And then there…
06-06 Indonesia
“Close the Window, Close the Window.” I was screaming to the taxi driver, because the air coming into the back of his cab was burning our eyes. I never experienced anything like it.We were at the International Small Business Congress in Jakarta and it was 1994. And the day before the annual gathering of small…
06-07 The Future
If I was just thinking emotionally, I would have coal-fired generating stations shut down. Possibly the worst experience of my life was in Jakarta in 1994 and having my eyes burning because of the polluted air. I never forgot the fear I felt at the time, and my hatred of coal. But I was also…