By Taylor Kuykendall

As coal production and generation in the U.S. continues to fade, the Sierra Club launched a report Nov. 4 touting its role in the already historic reduction in coal use and carbon dioxide emissions.

The Sierra Club said the reductions leave President Barack Obama in a strong negotiating position when international leaders meet in upcoming climate talks in Paris hosted by the United Nations. Already, the report notes, one-third of the U.S. coal fleet has retired from where it stood in 2010, and the report projects more than half could be replaced within the next decade.

"Thanks to the Beyond Coal campaign and the community leaders who have stood up against the coal industry, the U.S. is leading the world in cutting dangerous carbon pollution," said former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. "The domestic reductions will give President Obama a strong negotiating hand at the U.N.'s climate summit in Paris and hopefully we can help lead the rest of the world in the same direction."

Bill Bissett, president of the Kentucky Coal Association, said that Sierra Club's maneuvers against coal are not only going to hurt those in coalfield communities, but will also more broadly hurt those who currently use coal-fired power. A resolution introduced by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., in October calls on the U.S. Senate to assert its role in treaty review in an effort to create a potential way for Congress to have a say in the talks.

"He may make promises in Paris, but he only has 400-plus days left as president of the United States," Bissett said. "The question becomes who will the next occupant of the White House be and what will their position be, not only regarding coal, but energy production in the United States?"

“I'm sure to two people who live in New York and San Francisco like Bloomberg and Brune, they're happy to celebrate their victories with the Beyond Coal campaign.”

 Bill Bissett, president, Kentucky Coal Association

Bloomberg Philanthropies has pumped $80 million into the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal campaign. The Sierra Club has utilized the partnership with Bloomberg in a wide-ranging effort to thwart coal generation and production projects. They say the result is the single largest reduction in carbon pollution in the U.S. over the past five years.

In a recent interview with SNL Energy, Sierra Club's Bruce Nilles, senior director of Beyond Coal, explained a broad effort to attack the industry in the courts, in public service commission hearings and on political fronts. For example, including weekends, Nilles said the group is filing a lawsuit roughly every three days.

Now the partnership is aiming to accelerate replacement of coal with other forms of energy to meet the U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan requirements over the next decade and decrease economy-wide carbon emissions by 26% to 28% of 2005 levels by 2025.

"With the help of Bloomberg Philanthropies and thousands of activists across the country, a fair and just transition to an economy powered by 100% clean energy is in our sights, and dirty coal is becoming a thing of the past," said Michael Brune, Sierra Club executive director.

The report also notes that the U.S. is well below the 2015 carbon emissions target set by the 2009 Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation. The bill was strongly opposed by the coal industry and failed in Congress. Sierra Club says despite failure to pass that bill, because of their efforts, 2015 carbon dioxide emissions — projected to come under 2 billion tons from the electric sector and 5.3 billion tons economy-wide — will be the lowest since 1995.

According to the report, compiled from data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration and independent research firm the Rhodium Group, since 2010, the U.S. has retired 41,978 MW of coal generation. In the two decades between 1990 and 2009 the U.S. retired less than 10,000 MW of coal power.

In a joint opinion article published by CNN titled "We're winning the war against coal," Brune and Bloomberg acknowledged that part of the reduction in emissions has come from "cleaner energy sources" — natural gas has displaced most coal market share — and fuel efficiency standards. However, the two said the data shows reduction in coal has been the biggest victory when it comes to reducing emissions.

"Market forces have been moving against the coal industry for some time, due to wind and solar becoming competitive, the industry cutting wasteful demand and the natural gas boom," the opinion piece stated. "But the decline in coal use also stems in large measure from citizens demanding cleaner air and action on climate change. People across the country joined with the Sierra Club and many other organizations in standing up for their right to breathe clean air. Five years ago, coal pollution helped kill 13,000 Americans a year. Now, that number is down to 7,500."

Marty Durbin, president and CEO of America's Natural Gas Alliance, touted the role natural gas has played in an October news release in which the alliance celebrated overtaking coal as the nation's largest fuel source for electricity generation for the second time in history and for the year in July. Historic low prices from increased natural gas supply coupled with growing demand have swelled the fuel's share of electric generation.

"As we know from past experience, greater use of natural gas in power generation is a major driver for reducing carbon emissions — and other pollutants — from this sector. … These are promising signs as our nation works toward a cleaner environment and a stronger economy," Durbin said.

Brune and Bloomberg also said coal reductions have "only just begun." Attempts by various industries and a large set of states to overturn the Clean Power Plan, they wrote, are not likely to be successful.

"There will always be U.S. elected officials who seek to protect special interests, but they are fighting an irreversible trend, and they should be focused on helping workers from the coal industry find new opportunities," Bloomberg and Brune wrote. "Cities, states and businesses will continue moving away from coal and investing in clean energy, because it helps both to protect public health and create jobs, by attracting capital and talent."

Predictions about the future of coal have become increasingly dire. The Charleston (W.Va.) Gazette-Mail recently reported that Charles Patton, president of American Electric Power Co. Inc.'s Appalachian Power Co. subsidiary, the largest electric utility in West Virginia, told a room of energy executives that coal is not coming back.

"With or without the Clean Power Plan, the economics of alternatives to fossil-based fuels are making inroads in the utility plan," Patton said. "Companies are making decisions today where they are moving away from coal-fired generation."

On their recent round of earnings calls, several major coal producers reported to investors that they were dealing with a " significant and permanent" shift in how the market share for electricity generation shakes out.

“ There will always be U.S. elected officials who seek to protect special interests, but they are fighting an irreversible trend, and they should be focused on helping workers from the coal industry find new opportunities. ”

 Michael Brune, executive director, Sierra Club and Michael Bloomberg, former New York City Mayor

In coalfield communities, particularly in Central Appalachia where other economic opportunities are scant, the movement has had a significant impact. A recent analysis by SNL Energy found that coal jobs are rapidly dropping off, most deeply in a band of counties stretching across West Virginia and Kentucky.

"I'm sure to two people who live in New York and San Francisco like Bloomberg and Brune, they're happy to celebrate their victories with the Beyond Coal campaign," Bissett said. "But, this announcement leaves out a great deal of information. First, they fail to recognize the extreme hardships they are creating for coal miners and their families across this nation as well as the countless number of other families who are suffering because of their political and anti-coal actions."

Bissett also said it was "completely offensive" to use the term "war on coal" and to suggest they were winning it in the title of the opinion piece. "I spend a lot of my time explaining that the coal industry is in trouble," Bissett said. "The fact that they would use language that has been so vilified in activist circles just shows the total callousness or lack of sensitivity to what's happening to the people in the coalfields. … [The term has] mostly been used in Republican circles as more of a touchstone for the issues facing our industry, but the idea of 'winning' it by putting coal miners out of business, closing coal plants and raising electricity rates is particularly offensive."

Mary Anne Hitt, director of the Beyond Coal campaign, said officials in her home state of West Virginia and other coal communities need to "stop pointing fingers and start leading." She said the shift away from coal is not going to be reversed and the nation needs to ensure resources are delivered to those with long ties to the coal industry that now need to transition to a new economy.

"They can start by supporting the President's Power Plus Plan to invest in coal families and communities," Hitt said. "The clean energy revolution is creating one of the biggest new economic opportunities in American history, and leaders from coal country should be focused on seizing those opportunities, rather than making a futile attempt to turn back the clock."

The decline in utility coal demand and significant debt levels weighted against a weak metallurgical coal market have resulted in a wave of bankruptcies that has affected even major producers such as Alpha Natural Resources Inc., James River Coal Co., Patriot Coal Corp. and Walter Energy Inc.