Kentucky Coal Museum is going Solar to save money

[Shadows]

A company called Bluegrass Solar is in the midst of installing a roughly 60 kW system on the museum’s roof that, when completed, will provide power to both the museum and, through an agreement with museum owner Southeast Community and Technical College, the rest of the town’s municipal utility. According to the Louisville Courier-Journal, the museum’s power bill has been around $2,100 a month, “but this initiative is expected to save between $8,000 and $10,000 a year.” "It is,” the college’s communications director conceded to a local TV station, "a little ironic."

In 2016 alone, the US solar industry created more new jobs (51,000) than there are coal miners still working in the US (50,200). There are now 260,000 solar workers in the US — five times the number of coal miners.

Trump may see political advantage in pandering to the dwindling coal industry (and lying to its workers for populist theater). But even in the heart of coal country, even in Benham, Kentucky, people are beginning to understand that coal belongs in a museum and solar belongs on the roof.


Full Article - http://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/4/10/15234330/trump-coal-museum

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

[Vosem]

If Trump is true to his word

Time to invest your savings!

[7,052,770]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

[pbrower2a]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

When cats go vegan.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

[Gass3268]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

Coal declined because of the natural gas boom.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

Coal declined because of the natural gas boom.

Obama regulations have caused far more harm to Coal than the market ever did.

[Gass3268]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

Coal declined because of the natural gas boom.

Obama regulations have caused far more harm to Coal than the market ever did.

Nope

Coal’s decline: Driven by policy or technology?

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From researchers at the Great Lakes Energy Institute at Case Western Reserve University.

[7,052,770]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

It's a very small number of jobs that have terrible consequences for the health of the workers and the health of the planet. It would be cheaper to just give coal miners a lifetime pension than to pay their Medicare/Medicaid costs and that doesn't factor in the cost of environmental damages coal does

[Shadows]

It is incredibly ignorant to even argue this. Coal has frequent boom/bust cycles & has been in a long term decline for decades. But fracking really ate away a lot of coal jobs & now the rest will be taken away by solar in a few years. Solar is crashing & coal has no future.

Besides this job argument is insane considering Solar with 1% overall share gives 373K jobs while coal with 30% odd has 85K odd jobs. Why on earth are people cheering for a fuel which will likely cause severe damage & put the future of the next generations into big questuon !

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I don't believe we can easily transfer 85K workers from Coal to Solar - sure, you can easily find work for the truck drivers, foremen, etc. - but the miners themselves are out of luck.

[7,052,770]

I don't believe we can easily transfer 85K workers from Coal to Solar - sure, you can easily find work for the truck drivers, foremen, etc. - but the miners themselves are out of luck.

Give them a pension now. It's so much cheaper than Medicare paying for their black lung and cancers, not to mention paying for the environmental impact of coal.

[Shadows]

I don't believe we can easily transfer 85K workers from Coal to Solar - sure, you can easily find work for the truck drivers, foremen, etc. - but the miners themselves are out of luck.

Give them a pension now. It's so much cheaper than Medicare paying for their black lung and cancers, not to mention paying for the environmental impact of coal.

Solar added 70K odd jobs in a year alone. Solar is only 1% of all power, coal is 30% & it will take time & gradually in 15-20 years, coal will likely be gone. The challenge is to retrain the coal miners & integrate them into the new economy. Unlike Factory jobs being replaced by dirt cheep Mcdonald jobs, solar jobs are decent paying, not minimum wage jobs !

Why are there no discussions & ideas about new jobs for coal workers? I remember Bernie in the WV townhall saying apart from infra investment, it is vital to develop good quality broadband in rural areas as it will lead to many different types of industries & ancillary jobs. Coal is a losing battle!

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I don't believe we can easily transfer 85K workers from Coal to Solar - sure, you can easily find work for the truck drivers, foremen, etc. - but the miners themselves are out of luck.

Give them a pension now. It's so much cheaper than Medicare paying for their black lung and cancers, not to mention paying for the environmental impact of coal.

Solar added 70K odd jobs in a year alone. Solar is only 1% of all power, coal is 30% & it will take time & gradually in 15-20 years, coal will likely be gone. The challenge is to retrain the coal miners & integrate them into the new economy. Unlike Factory jobs being replaced by dirt cheep Mcdonald jobs, solar jobs are decent paying, not minimum wage jobs !

Why are there no discussions & ideas about new jobs for coal workers? I remember Bernie in the WV townhall saying apart from infra investment, it is vital to develop good quality broadband in rural areas as it will lead to many different types of industries & ancillary jobs. Coal is a losing battle!

Regarding Retraining - I'd have to be convinced that this would actually prove successful - that the miners could be retrained well, within a reasonable amount of time, and actually find work in their new industry. But I'm not opposed to it in principle.

Regarding a Pension - This, however, seems to invite an image of the government saying essentially, "This industry is against our ideology, so say goodbye to it - here's some money so you don't actually die.". That sets a dangerous precedent of closing industries for ideological reasons. Sure, right now it's the "polluting, evil, horrendous coal industry", but it could easily evolve into a closure of an industry you like at some point down the line.

Also, I will say that I recognize that even without the Obama regulations, the industry will eventually die on its own. But you cannot deny that the Obama regulations have sped up its demise.

[SWE]

If Trump is true to his word, Coal should come roaring back against the odds. Just wait and see.

Why do you want that? Just one of your idiosyncrasies?

Because it's jobs. Sure, it has declined due to increasing regulations under Obama, but when those are repealed, the jobs will come roaring back.

Right after the typewriter market booms.

[pbrower2a]

I was in southern and eastern Kentucky (Cumberland Parkway, I-75) and I saw little evidence of coal as an important factor in the local economy.  In a tight labor market there were no suggestions that people could get jobs as coal miners. I saw no billboards (granted, there are few billboards visible on the Cumberland Parkway) touting the coal industry or politicians as 'friends of coal'. I saw ads suggesting that people could get medical help for opiate addiction or could get legal help to file disability claims. I saw more ads touting college education.     

(My destinations included Mammoth Cave and Great Smoky Mountain National Parks).

The reality is becoming obvious: even to hold bad jobs in restaurants and retail places, it's a good idea to have a college education. Tourism is a more reliable source of income now in some places than is coal. Nobody gets black lung from selling bluegrass music or arts and crafts.

Maybe I find the string of tourist traps between Interstate 40 and the northern main entrance to Great Smoky Mountains National Park quite worthy of a miss, but millions of people apparently disagree with me in that assessment enough that Tennessee 66 and US 441 south of I-40 are lined with businesses. Commerce is the American way of life, and it is better that we have ugly tourist traps than mass unemployment.

Kentucky is not as successful as Tennessee with tourism... but it seems to be getting the clue.   

[Intell]

I don't believe we can easily transfer 85K workers from Coal to Solar - sure, you can easily find work for the truck drivers, foremen, etc. - but the miners themselves are out of luck.

What is it with all this special deference given to coal miners?

Your job is dead....move on already. No one bats an eye at job losses in other industry.

Right-Wing Logic right there.

[Maxwell]

Solar is producing more jobs than Coal has total.

[pbrower2a]

Would the Right take offense at the big reduction in retail jobs as department stores die? Probably not -- because retail work is transient work, work that offers little more than steady employment. Employee discount? Sure -- and it will go mostly into expensive clothes for work.