Coal Crisis Coming?

[benburch]

I just read in "Trains" magazine of a major disruption of coal deliveries that has been going on since mid-May on the BNSF/UP Orin subdivision in Wyoming's Powder River Basin. It seems that coal dust pollutant shed from moving coal trains combined with heavy spring rains and local mud to undermine and nearly destroy much of the divisions several hundred miles of track. There have been several derailments, and utilities as far away as Georgia are behind in their shipments. Due to slow orders, and major track repair work, deliveries have been at around 50% of schedule since mid-May.

Given that power plants typically have a coal pile that can serve them for a couple of months, and that few contract only with a single source, there is no immediate crisis, but if this situation persists, it is unclear to me if other sources of coal can make up this huge loss of tonnage.

And with the price of fuel-oil skyrocketing, and Natural Gas close behind, many Utilities would have naturally been looking to domestic coal to stabilize their price of electricity production.

Are we on the verge of a "perfect storm" of energy source shortfalls? Will there be Winter disruptions of electric service? Or will the lack of coal push fuel oil and natural gas prices much higher than they would otherwise have gone this Winter?

I think this problem may bear some investigation by those of you who are energy sector reporters.

[benburch]

1. Some links.

UP status page on the disruption;

http://www.uprr.com/customers/energy/sprb/updates.shtml

BNSF page on the disruption;

http://domino.bnsf.com/website/updates.nsf/0/397753E88A03A0978625703700661B2D?Open

Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen on the disruption;

http://www.ble-t.org/pr/news/headline.asp?id=14108

[NNadir]

5. Anything that stops coal is a good thing.

Coal is suicide.

The fact that nobody is demonstrating to shut coal plants is a measure of exactly how stupid we are.

[benburch]

6. While I agree with that...

Having no heat in the Winter would be deadly to many.

As we transition OUT of coal, we still need to keep the turbines spinning.

[NNadir]

9. The problem is that no one is working on the "transition."

The whole problem is mired in deadly mysticism.

If the climate collapses, it will also be "deadly to many."

[benburch]

10. Agreed.

That is why we need a Revolution.

[Trajan]

2. GOP Method of jacking up prices and gouging the public ...

Create scarcity ...

The Enronization of the petroleum markets continues unabated ...

With the repeal of PUCHA, the Enronization of the utilities has begun ....

The GOP hate taxes, but they TAX citizens with their exorbitant private sector prices in ever increasing levels that are WAY tougher on families than the extremely low tax cuts they offered the middle class ....

The GOP plan to rip off America is working ...

[madrchsod]

3. coal futures have dropped since march

i live two miles from the mainline and haven`t noticed any big drop off in coal trains recently. they are reporting that any shortages in the east would be picked up by imports or west virgina coal.
i still haven`t figured out the natural gas price increases there is a new pipeline from canada three mile from where i live that is basically being underused.
i smell the resurrected corpse of enron

[amandabeech]

8. Canada may be cutting back on its natural gas imports.

Their resource may be in decline, and they need lots to heat their homes in that climate.

The big users are the tar sands extraction and refinery outfits. They use the gas to make steam for extraction and to make hydrogen for the refining process, I think.

[benburch]

11. You mean exports, right? nt

[TheFarseer]

4. I heard not long ago that we have a 200 year supply of coal

My guess is rethugs will take this info and say, "If we'd privatize utilities, this kind of stuff wouldn't happen" And everyone will jump and that and say, "YEAH" Eventhough that makes about as much sense as saying, "If people would stop feeding the bears, then companies wouldn't hire illegal immigrants"

[joanski0]

7. I live in Southwestern Pennsylvania, and we

have plenty of coal here. It's just that Dick Cheney's Wyoming has been chosen to get the coal contracts.

[wli]

12. Enronizing coal, too?

Go figure.

[LiberalEsto]

13. I wonder if this is an excuse to promote nuke-u-lar energy

Didn't the pro-nukies get some kind of windfall in the new energy bill?

They're being fairly low-key, but it seems like there is a push to build new nuclear power plants. Even though there's noplace to dispose of the spend fuel.

[benburch]

14. Well, I think the tracks got messed up legitimately...

But I also know that our energy situation is really very hand-to-mouth. There is not a lot of excess capacity in the system, especially in regards rail assets.

[Massacure]

15. Not really.

They received loan guarantees so that the nuclear industry can take out loans at the same rate as the federal government, which is usually cheaper than on the open market. The bill ensures that the government pays for delays in the licensing process as a direct result of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. They also extended the Price-Anderson Act until 2025, which is a pool of money paid by the nuclear industry that would be used in case of accident.