I was wondering, HO, if you had ever seen Gregson Vaux's Peak Coal analysis, which I believe he worked on as a consultant for the Dept. of Energy.  A summary was published here:

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/052504_coal_peak.html

If so, I'd like to know what you think of it.

I'd second that request!  HO's report suggests that Peabody and others know we are headed in the direction of a lot more coal given peak oil and peak North American natural gas.  Since coal currently accounts for only one unit of equivalent energy for every three units of energy coming from oil and natural gas, the increased coal use could potentially be truly huge to cover: (1) growth in electrical demand currently supplied by coal, (2) additional growth to make up for reduction in natural gas electrical generation, and (3) yet additional growth for synfuels. Is it really practical to double or quadruple coal production in the next decade or two? This would have a disastrous effect on CO2 production given that current coal burning generates twice the CO2 per unit of energy that natural gas and oil do.  Eeesh.