Coal

For coal, the future of both extraction and consumption depends on new technology. If successfully deployed, innovative technologies could enable the use of coal that is unminable by gasifying it underground; reduce coal's carbon emissions; or allow coal to take the place of natural gas or petroleum. Without them, coal simply may not have much of a future. Are these technologies close to development? Are they economical? Will they work? Museletter #197.

Recent reports on global coal reserves, surveyed in previous chapters, generally point to the likelihood of supply limits appearing relatively soon—within the next two decades (a contrary view is represented solely by the BGR report ["Lignite and Hard Coal: Energy Suppliers for World Needs until the Year 2100 – An Outlook," 2007]). According to this near-consensus, coal output in China, the world's foremost producer, could begin to decline within just a few years. MuseLetter 196.

China is the world's foremost coal producer and consumer, surpassing the United States by a factor of two on both scores and accounting for 40 percent of total world production. Museletter #195.

The United States has the world's largest coal reserves. With energy prices constantly rising and coal considered a "cheap" alternative, Richard Heinberg's survey of the literature on coal reserves is important reading. There's reason to believe that reserves are being overestimated, as they have been through the industry's history. Museletter #194.

In this month's MuseLetter, Heinberg shares some material from his upcoming book on coal. Also included are his May column for The Ecologist magazine ("What Car do You Drive?"), a Foreword that he wrote for the new edition of Mat Stein’s brilliant book When Technology Fails, and a brief blog for the Post Carbon Institute website.

Coal prices are predicted to hit $300 per tonne this week, a threefold rise that eclipses even the most bullish forecasts made just a few days ago. Experts say there is still no ceiling in sight and predict further upward pressure on European power prices.

This MuseLetter, and several more during the next few months, will be chapters for a forthcoming book on coal, to be published by Post Carbon Press. This month's issue is the book's Introduction. The world appears poised for a headlong sprint toward greater dependence on coal. This book's purpose is to examine one crucial question that will shape this next great coal rush: How much is left?

All of a sudden coal, so long the Cinderella of fossil fuels, is not just in demand but in desperately short supply. A chance combination of crises in big producing and exporting countries has pushed the price of European imports to almost $140 per tonne – double the level of a year ago. But according to Gerard McCloskey, publisher of McCloskey's Coal Report, there is no quick fix to the coal crunch, and prices may still have a long way to go.

"In terms of resolving these two problems of peak fossil fuels and climate change... mitigation policies for peak oil, peak coal and peak gas should be done in tandem with mitigation policies for climate change. And I think there's no reason that that shouldn't happen. In fact it makes the most sense to me." NASA research scientist Dr. Pushker Kharecha speaks with David Room about "Implications of 'peak oil' for atmospheric CO₂ and climate," a paper Kharecha co-wrote with one of the world's foremost climate scientists, Dr. James Hansen. The paper, which has been submitted for peer-reviewed publication in a scientific journal, is one of few that consider both climate instability and oil depletion.

This book is not an introduction to the subject of Peak Oil; several existing volumes serve that function (including my own The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies). Instead it addresses the social and historical context in which the event is occurring, and explores how we can reorganize our thinking and action in several critical areas in order to better navigate this perilous time.