Coal news and updates

Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders will square off Tuesday in West Virginia’s Democratic primaries. But the real fight for the hard-hit coal state is with Donald Trump, who is gaining widespread favor among Appalachian voters.

The presumptive Republican nominee has claimed he will revive mining jobs and boost heavy industry in this downtrodden slice of American coal country. During a May 5 campaign stop in Charleston, he told a fired-up crowd of 13,000 people he would make the state “better than ever before” if he wins the White House.

Clinton and Sanders also have vowed to stimulate economic growth in regions suffering from steep declines in coal production. But both Democratic candidates have promised to adopt tougher climate change policies, which would inevitably make it costlier to burn high-carbon coal. Trump, by contrast, is entirely dig, baby, dig.

The real estate mogul — now the presumptive GOP nominee — is leading front-runner Clinton in West Virginia 57 percent to 30 percent. He also leads Sanders 56 percent to 35 percent, Public Policy Polling found in a May 3 survey of about 1,200 West Virginia voters.

“People just like his no-nonsense, take-the-gloves-off attitude,” said Chris Hamilton, vice president of the West Virginia Coal Association, which represents around 95 percent of the state’s coal production. The trade group officially endorsed Trump earlier this week, and Hamilton was onstage at the Charleston rally to hand Trump a white miner’s helmet.

“He appears to have the resources and the drive to do what’s necessary to revitalize our mining and manufacturing industries,” Hamilton said by phone hours before meeting Trump. “He certainly has a strong will and personal mission to try to get that done.”

The race to capture West Virginia voters is unfolding as the coal sector, the state’s main economic engine, is shriveling. Coal production in the Appalachian state is expected to total no more than 90 million short tons this year — a more-than-40-percent drop from 2008 levels of around 160 million tons of coal.

Nationwide, coal production has dropped to its lowest level in nearly three decades, at less than 900 million tons in 2015. Dozens of U.S. mining companies, including giants like Peabody Energy Corp. and Arch Coal Inc., have filed for bankruptcy in recent months as their earnings declined and debt loads soared.

Three key factors are driving the downturn. In the U.S., power plant operators are increasingly ditching coal and instead burning cheap, abundant natural gas to generate electricity. Stronger federal clean air and water policies are making it more expensive to operate coal plants, especially older facilities. Globally, China’s sluggish economy has resulted in lower demand for metallurgical coal used in steelmaking, dragging down prices.

Metallurgical coal is the predominate type produced in southern West Virginia. Mining there is relatively more expensive compared to other U.S. regions because the coal seams are thin and trapped deep underground. So when prices dip, this area is first to feel the economic ripple effects, said John Deskins, who directs the Bureau of Business and Economic Research at West Virginia University in Morgantown.

Source: Business Line