How Coal Country is Voting (Images)

[Young Conservative]

As you can see, there was a clear favoring among the Republican primary for Trump in these counties and a relatively clear favoring for sanders in these counties. (These counties being the major coal producing ones). The margins in these counties in PA and OH all went slightly toward Romney in 2012, but the margins weren't great enough to surpass President Obama's margins in urban areas Could Trump increase margins in these counties, where he appears popular and sec. Clinton appears unpopular? And could her continued hardline stance on coal hurt her in Ohio and PA? Unfortunately the maps of coal production won't load, but they comprise of western Indiana, southern Illinois, Kentucky, West Virginia, south west Virginia (lol confusing), Southern and southeast ohio, and much of central Pennsylvania and surrounding areas.

[beaver2.0]

I think we can be pretty sure Trump will be winning West Virginia.

[Young Conservative]

I think we can be pretty sure Trump will be winning West Virginia.

Yes I do believe we can Ha, but the real question is how he cant win over already trending republican Blue Collar voters in Ohio and Pennsylvania

[SillyAmerican]

Could Hillary's continued hardline stance on coal hurt her in Ohio and PA? Well, she's basically told miners that she'll be working to take away their jobs and close down coal processing, so yeah, it will hurt her.

[DINGO Joe]

See there's this thing called fracking and this formation called the Marcellus and it's little (or possibly big) brother called the Utica.  Cheap plentiful natural gas that can be used to....generate electricity instead of coal.  What states have reduced their coal burning the most?




Of course, that is only one side of the coin, the other side is what states have taken advantage of cheap NG, well let's look at Pennsylvania home of the Marcellus and which now produces more energy via NG than coal.

In 2008 coal was used to generate 118,000 megawatt hours of electricity in PA
In 2015 coal was used to generate 66,000 megawatt hours

In 2008 NG was used to generate 19,000 megawatt hours of electricity in PA
In 2015 NG was used to generate 60,000 megawatt hours

This year NG will pass coal in generation in PA, and there another 4 NG plants being built right now,  and at least 6 others in the permitting phase.

Other states near the M-U, like VA, NJ, DE, OH, IN, even Louisville, KY have added NG generation (of the super efficient combined cycle kind) to take advantage of the new bounty.  Beyond that, NC, GA, FL, etc... have all switched from Appalachian coal to NG.  Pretty much every state except WV. 

Oh sure, there is some amoral UnAmerican filth in this country who will lie to coal and tell them they will make them great again, but the facts are hard to look past.  If all of this is too hard for those with tiny Trump brains to comprehend, this video (from Donald's favorite movie) should demonstrate how the competition between coal and NG is going in the region that used to use Appalachian coal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tunKokXjuks

[SillyAmerican]

See there's this thing called fracking and this formation called the Marcellus and it's little (or possibly big) brother called the Utica.  Cheap plentiful natural gas that can be used to....generate electricity instead of coal.  What states have reduced their coal burning the most?




Of course, that is only one side of the coin, the other side is what states have taken advantage of cheap NG, well let's look at Pennsylvania home of the Marcellus and which now produces more energy via NG than coal.

In 2008 coal was used to generate 118,000 megawatt hours of electricity in PA
In 2015 coal was used to generate 66,000 megawatt hours

In 2008 NG was used to generate 19,000 megawatt hours of electricity in PA
In 2015 NG was used to generate 60,000 megawatt hours

This year NG will pass coal in generation in PA, and there another 4 NG plants being built right now,  and at least 6 others in the permitting phase.

Other states near the M-U, like VA, NJ, DE, OH, IN, even Louisville, KY have added NG generation (of the super efficient combined cycle kind) to take advantage of the new bounty.  Beyond that, NC, GA, FL, etc... have all switched from Appalachian coal to NG.  Pretty much every state except WV.  

Oh sure, there is some amoral UnAmerican filth in this country who will lie to coal and tell them they will make them great again, but the facts are hard to look past.  If all of this is too hard for those with tiny Trump brains to comprehend, this video (from Donald's favorite movie) should demonstrate how the competition between coal and NG is going in the region that used to use Appalachian coal

The original question posed by Silent Cal was ...could her continued hardline stance on coal hurt her in Ohio and PA?, and I don't think there's any question that Hillary's anti-coal position will hurt her in the region. But perhaps I have a tiny Trump brain, I'm not sure...

[Landslide Lyndon]

The original question posed by Silent Cal was ...could her continued hardline stance on coal hurt her in Ohio and PA?, and I don't think there's any question that Hillary's anti-coal position will hurt her in the region. But perhaps I have a tiny Trump brain, I'm not sure...

I am.

[IceSpear]

Do you guys realize that Democrats have already completely collapsed in coal country? It's already baked in. Go check the 2012 election map. I wish Trump luck in his quest to improve on Romney's 81 point win in Leslie County, KY.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

How will non-coal areas in coal states vote? I live in a non-coal area in what is otherwise a coal state, and everyone I meet thinks Trump is a joke.

[Holmes]

How will non-coal areas in coal states vote? I live in a non-coal area in what is otherwise a coal state, and everyone I meet thinks Trump is a joke.

Yeah, but that might be a mix of confirmation bias and only associating with people who share similar beliefs as you.

Unless you live in Louisville, your county will probably go to Trump.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

Unless you live in Louisville, your county will probably go to Trump.

I'm certain Clinton will win the counties with Lexington and Frankfort.

[Boston Bread]

How will non-coal areas in coal states vote? I live in a non-coal area in what is otherwise a coal state, and everyone I meet thinks Trump is a joke.

Yeah, but that might be a mix of confirmation bias and only associating with people who share similar beliefs as you.

Unless you live in Louisville, your county will probably go to Trump.

Campbell county is traditionally Republican and while Trump isn't a good fit for the area (it went to Cruz with a stronger than usual Kasich performance), the place will usually go Republican even when Dems win the state.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

Campbell county is traditionally Republican and while Trump isn't a good fit for the area (it went to Cruz with a stronger than usual Kasich performance), the place will usually go Republican even when Dems win the state.

The way things are going, I'm starting to have doubts that Campbell County will stay Republican.

[Meclazine for Israel]

You said images....
But seriously, those opening maps are excellent quality. Good to show my children how the USA votes by county vs state.

[Rules for me, but not for thee]

Interesting how Bernie vs Clinton is almost a full north vs. south situation. Except stupid Ohio, of course. I hate Ohio.

[Holmes]

Interesting how Bernie vs Clinton is almost a full north vs. south situation. Except stupid Ohio, of course. I hate Ohio.

Yeah. In the north, it's more urban vs. rural, with suburbs usually swinging either way depending on the state (with some exceptions, of course). In the south, it's more whether registered Democrats forced to vote in the Democratic primary or not.

[catographer]

Do you guys realize that Democrats have already completely collapsed in coal country? It's already baked in. Go check the 2012 election map. I wish Trump luck in his quest to improve on Romney's 81 point win in Leslie County, KY.

He will get 100% lol.

[catographer]

Can someone explain to me (I already sort of understand, but this is just weird to me) why the issue of coal is so singular and tremendously important in this region to the voters there. Isn't there anything else to their lives other than coal? They can vote without thinking about coal, right? What will they do when coal is no longer a sector?

[Crumpets]

Here's an image of how coal country is voting:

[Bandit3 the Worker]

Can someone explain to me (I already sort of understand, but this is just weird to me) why the issue of coal is so singular and tremendously important in this region to the voters there. Isn't there anything else to their lives other than coal?

There ain't much else. But that's actually the Republicans' fault.

[DINGO Joe]

Can someone explain to me (I already sort of understand, but this is just weird to me) why the issue of coal is so singular and tremendously important in this region to the voters there. Isn't there anything else to their lives other than coal? They can vote without thinking about coal, right? What will they do when coal is no longer a sector?

In the Central Appalachian coal region (East Kentucky, Southern Virginia and SW VA) it's the only thing there is.   Many of these counties had two, three or in the case of McDowell, five times as many people in 1950 than they do now.  About the only other industry than coal is prisons both state and federal which creates a few jobs and a fake population.  The terrain is difficult, roads, housing, water all substandard, so they'll keep doing what they've been doing for decades--wither away.

Pennsylvania, Ohio and even North WV are more connected with society at large and the natural gas industry has provided other job opportunities.  Though it's been so successful at producing NG that there's a glut, but Ohio and PA and other nearby states (sans WV) will keep building combined cycle NG power plants until coal miners are just a legend.  Of course Ohio and PA are much bigger states than WV and coal is a very minor influence there, half the coal produced in PA is in one county, Greene, a county with fewer than 40,000 people.

[DINGO Joe]

EIA was very cooperative and put up a beautiful map showing the additional NG generation being built over the next 3 years:



http://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=26312

Total slaughtering of coal.  It's like those murder mysteries where it turns out everybody did it.

[Rules for me, but not for thee]

I still have the not-so-popular opinion that nuclear is still best on the mass scale. Modern nuke tech is so much safer.  The problem is retiring and replacing these old generation 1 and 2 reactors.  Those are what caused Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and Fukushima.  France is full on with modern nuclear power and have you heard of any problems there?

EIA was very cooperative and put up a beautiful map showing the additional NG generation being built over the next 3 years:



http://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=26312

Total slaughtering of coal.  It's like those murder mysteries where it turns out everybody did it.

[Cranberry]

I still have the not-so-popular opinion that nuclear is still best on the mass scale. Modern nuke tech is so much safer.  The problem is retiring and replacing these old generation 1 and 2 reactors.  Those are what caused Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and Fukushima.  France is full on with modern nuclear power and have you heard of any problems there?

Not that that is at all on topic, but the real big problem in my eyes is that we have absolutely no clue what to do with the highly dangerous, highly poisonous nuclear waste - all we have so far are no more but provisional and transitional methods, with nuclear waste often shipped time and time again between some place and another. We really need to find a way to finally and properly get rid of all nuclear waste - before that's not done, I'm not really the biggest fan of producing even more of what we can't handle in the first place.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

The future is in green energy. As a Kentuckian, I accept this.