The wind and sun cult reckon ‘coal is dead’. The truth is the energy-rich black stuff hasn’t suffered so much as a flesh wound. World energy markets keep defying long-repeated predictions that coal’s days are over.
Coal remains critical because it does something that sunshine and breezes can never do; fed into coal-fired power plants (such as the Isogo HELE plant in Japan depicted above) it provides cheap and reliable power around-the-clock, irrespective of the weather. No need for batteries. No need for back up. The reason that coal remains in constant (and indeed rising) demand is that simple.
As the team from Jo Nova outline below, the grand wind and solar transition has failed to make any dent in the world’s demand for coal.
More coal burned on Earth in 2023 than ever before in human history
Jo Nova Blog
Jo Nova
18 December 2023
The best kept secret in the world is that humans are using more coal than ever.
So much for the “stranded dead asset”. In 2022 the world set a new all-time record for coal use — reaching 8.4 billion tons. In 2023, despite all the Net Zero billions in spending, despite the boom in windmills and solar panels, global demand for coal will top 8.54 billion tons.
The IEA is the “International Energy Agency” — supposedly, the impartial servant of 31 nations worth of taxpayers. Yet they decided to ignore the world record and instead tell us how coal is set to decline. It’s what they think the taxpayers need to hear. Their press release:
It’s almost as if the IEA works for the renewables industry and their banker investors? Mr Vestas himself could hardly have written a more successful headline to hide the truth and gaslight the taxpayers.
The IEA has been predicting the end of coal for years. Back in 2017 the IEA was telling us China would move away from coal, because by 2025-2030 “solar would be cheaper than coal”. Instead, China’s burning more coal than ever before and the quarterly reporting season was a bloodbath for the solar and wind industries as projects get cancelled because their costs are rising.
In 2023 China uses more than half of the total coal on the planet — an extraordinary 4.5 billion tons of that 8.5 billion ton total.
The three largest coal producers in the world are China, India and Indonesia which account for a blockbuster 70% of global production. The IEA is convinced coal use will decline any day now, but China’s growth rate in coal use was 5% in 2023, and India’s was 8%. These are hardly signs of the plateau before the fall.
Note how the IEA add their favourite “projection” at the end
To put some perspective on the success of the renewables transition in reducing coal — Australia has more solar panels per capita than any other nation, and while global coal use is 8,536 Mt, in 2022 Australian coal use declined by all of 5 Mt. We only had to spend ten billion dollars to achieve that:
Overall coal consumption in Australia declined from 100 Mt in 2021 to 95 Mt in 2022 and is estimated to have continued its decrease over the course of 2023 with a reduction of 4%.
Rejoice, global coal use is six one-hundredth of a percent smaller thanks to the Australian Renewable Energy Target and the Safeguard Mechanism emissions market.
In the West the biggest reductions in coal use have come from exporting factories to China, which of course, don’t cut global coal use at all. And ponder at just how incredibly fast the transition to coal has been — from the West to the East:
This year, China, India and Southeast Asia are set to account for three-quarters of global consumption, up from only about one-quarter in 1990.
Just one generation ago…
Jo Nova Blog
STOP THESE THINGS 
The Navajo Indian Tribe in Arizona has massive reserves of coal on the land they own fully as a Federally recognized nation and have mineral rights. Look at how much land they have.
Arizona land mass 113,998 square miles
Navajo Nation land mass 27,413 square miles
Navajo coal used to be regularly powering local coal based energy facility that efficiently and effectively and reliably and cheaply 24/7 created power but the state shut that down to favor disabled handicapped parking for hundreds of square miles of fake clean energy wind sticks and solar chunks of paneling that relies on massive quantities of coal to produce.
Small plots of land do not have mineral rights at Chevelon Canyon where West Camp Wind Farm, Chevelon Butte Wind Farm, and solar installations are sprouting their unicorn wings of illusions of free energy AND these landowners do not have electricity lines while they pour billions into these wind and solar farms with wiring everywhere underground at great expense.
We should feel sorry for Native Americans who are shipping off their coal to China as portfolios are filling up? These costs will appear in electric bills and taxes for decades.
It’s becoming clear there’s a big ol’ hustle a happenin’. Enron was kids toys in comparison. They are filling up portfolios like that of Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board with green $$$ energy that those living in the USA are pouring in by paying their electric bills. They own Pattern Energy based in San Francisco where there are no wind propellers blocking their views. In fact the amount of wind farming south of I-40 at Winslow now is going to cover the size of 2 San Franciscos.
Also consider that Cloud Peak Mines in Wyoming went bankrupt and was sold to Navajo Transitional Energy Company (NTEC).
“October 01, 2021 NTEC assumes full operations at Navajo Mine, thus becoming the first tribally owned coal mining company to operate a coal mine on tribal land. Navajo Mine employs approximately 370 people, with 86% being enrolled as Navajo members” and “We are a leading US coal producer, supplying essential products to power our world” meaning China.
August 21, 2020—Over the past week, news in the southwest and California has been dominated by record demand for power and the threat of blackouts. Navajo Transitional Energy Company (NTEC) is helping ensure a steady supply of reliable power, while also reducing their own power demand.
Note also DIESEL is used to transport the coal where the coal powered trains are not connected to the coal plant and distribution they have to reliably power their Navajo Nation residents while again wind and solar farms connect to the main trunk lines some of which are less than a mile from properties with no electric power available.
What’s that glare? Oh it’s the usual FLAWS and contradictions of claims made about disabled wind and solar trickle energy that is mostly powering portfolios so those the likes of Canadian teachers can all retire and live in luxurious style.
So here’s a thought to consider, prior to the “clean energy” push, Navajo coal was limited in it’s markets more local. The energy was cheap and clean as carbon cleans the air like carbon does in water filters, and efficient. The move to push wind and solar and it’s illusions worldwide creating new markets and creating more manufacturing for most of the worlds solar and wind systems, and thus relying on more Navajo coal than produced before, which if we look at the spread sheets might indicate their sales SOARED and thus Wall Street massive gains as well and gains for Canadian teachers to retire in style so they can have their estates in Canada and buy second homes in Scottsdale, third homes elsewhere, where they don’t have to see ugly solar and wind farms, travel the world using massive quantities of fossil fuels, while boasting their theatricks of “saving the world” with their expensive coal consuming solar panels and wind turbines seen only in the open spaces while also waving with PRIDE their green energy flags in the faces of the ever expansive tented populations as if they aren’t creating that problem too.
reference:
https://horsepower.net/cloud_peak_mines_in_wyoming_bank.html
https://horsepower.net/chevelon-butte-wind
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_Energy
https://navenergy.com/
previous website incarnation https://web.archive.org/web/20200615045337/https://www.navajo-tec.com/empoweringdine
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navajo_Mine_and_Railroad
Just found this: https://www.outerdowsing.com/ and this: https://www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/news/article/1741/it-s-a-pylon-pile-on.
Insane zero is such fun!