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44 comments on Getting plowed also happens to coal

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LevinK on February 19, 2007 - 4:28pm

Thanks for bringing up these numbers, the math error is not that essential compared to that.

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expat on February 19, 2007 - 5:28pm

I simply noticed another glaring mistake, having a lot of experience reading the Washington Post, and his work was good.

Everyone makes mistakes, which is why many eyes looking is good.

Sometimes, I think a lot of people miss the various facts about Virginia and Hampton Roads - not only is the world's largest naval port there, one of the world's most important coal ports shares the same general space.

Energy is not the only use for coal - its role in steel production is fairly critical, and what comes from Appalachia is truly a world class resource still, and generally, it is not burned merely for electricity. This use is not exactly CO2 neutral, but it is much less damaging than burning coal for A/C or Internet access or refrigeration or cooking, or as wasteful - once created, steel is fairly easy to reuse.

One reason Germany retains a coal industry is the fact that German 'Steinkohle' is also useful in steel production - the lignite/brown coal areas have been pretty much retired ('Stillgelegt' - 'left in stillness' is one literal translation).

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LevinK on February 20, 2007 - 10:20am

I think you need to double-check the facts about Germany's coal industry:

http://www.cslforum.org/germany.htm

Germany has significant recoverable coal reserves, estimated (as of January 2005) at about 7.5 billion short tons, or about 0.7% of the world total. Most of this is lignite (or "brown coal") and is located in the region around the Rhine river and in the Halle Leipzig and Lower Lausitz regions of former East Germany. Most of Germany's coal production is lignite; Germany is by far the world's greatest lignite producer. Overall, Germany ranks seventh worldwide in coal production (and first in the EU) and fourth worldwide in coal consumption (and first in the EU), accounting for about 4.2% of the total world annual coal production and about 5.0% of the total world annual coal consumption. Annual production and consumption both dropped considerably over the first half of the 1990s, largely due to restructuring that occurred following the integration of former East Germany into Germany. Coal presently accounts for about 23% of all energy consumed in Germany, and about three-quarters of coal usage in Germany is for electric power production.

Several facts paint the exact picture of the Germany electricity generation future:
1) Germany uses primarily lignite for baseload electricity generation
2) Wind and solar power do not displace baseload generation. They tend to displace hydro and NG
3) Germany is phasing out its nuclear plants and it looks like is committed to insist on this madness
4) Currently Germany imports nuclear electricity from France, but it is doubtful this will be able fill the gap for much longer. All indications are that France will be too busy saving the ass of its northern neighbour.

Does this picture need any comments?

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expat on February 20, 2007 - 10:58am

Your facts are correct, but what I was trying to say was that the German Steinkohle industry still exists in subsidized form in part because of metallurgical coal (which is one reason why Hampton Roads is such a major coal port). Though I believe that cheaper Chinese imports have led to a serious decline in German production/use of domestic coal/coke in steel production over the last decade. (Some of the old coking plants were exported to China in the 1990s.)

As for the lignite/brown coal, the decline was related to major reductions in the mining of East Germany's very poor quality brown coal (if there is such a thing as sub-lignite, it would fit - I have also read descriptions of it as being one step up from peat) - obviously, other mines with higher quality lignite supply major amounts of coal for power.

The confusion is understandable - what I was trying to express is that coal is not only burnt for electricity, it also has major role in steel production, and much of the coal exported from Appalachia fits more into this framework than electric generation, at least into the early 1990s.

Obviously, Germany burns a lot of coal - that fact was in no sense meant to be obscured, however, it was merely that metallurgical coal / coke / etc. is also a high value use for coal - and German mines receive support in part due to their historical relationship to the German steel industry.

Germany will have a very hard time reducing its reliance on coal, no question. But major amounts of coal will still be mined as long as steel is used, a fact that tends to be a bit obscured in some of these discussions.