Trump’s EPA Knows Its New Coal Rule Could Kill 1,400 People Per Year

[HomerJS]

Well if Trump's new rules could kill 1400 people, let's hope they are all Trump supporters. After all this is what they wanted.

But according to the EPA’s own analysis, the increased air pollution could result in as many as 1,400 deaths per year by 2030 and 15,000 new cases of upper respiratory problems. Federal data has also shown that the air is getting dirtier: Last year had 15 percent more days with dirty air than the average between 2013 and 2016.

https://news.vice.com/en_us/article...new-coal-rule-could-kill-1400-people-per-year

 

[GodisanAtheist]

Compassion fatigue set in a while ago.

After the third time I've told my kids not to do something cause its gonna hurt, its time to stand back and let them learn that lesson for themselves.

Of course, my kids are smart enough to make the connection and don't come back and blame me for not warning them a fourth time so... ya never know.

 

[BoomerD]

Hey, now...let's be reasonable. We can't let the deaths of a few little people get in the way of making money!

 

[Brainonska511]

Compassion fatigue set in a while ago.

After the third time I've told my kids not to do something cause its gonna hurt, its time to stand back and let them learn that lesson for themselves.

Of course, my kids are smart enough to make the connection and don't come back and blame me for not warning them a fourth time so... ya never know.

Sorry, but these types of things are not analogous to telling your kid not to touch the hot stove. Something that kills more people over an extended period of time will be something the public largely ignores due to its perceived low risk.

 

[DrDoug]

I'm waiting for the announcement that brake pads and clutches will be made out of asbestos and that lead is being reintroduced to gasoline.

 

[ch33zw1z]

I'm confused, the EPA is still around? I'll be damned, these big government republicans need to shut that propoganda machine down. Clean air and water is.for beta cucks.

 

[K1052]

The uptick in last years's pollution is mostly attributed to the economy and all the wildfires. A trend isn't clear yet. That said this new rule is bullshit. Coal sucks and everybody knows it. I mean it isn't even cheap now that utilities actually have to deal with their aging plants and huge coal ash piles leaking heavy metals into groundwater.

Due to its growing unpopularity and economic disadvantages I think the US will be essentially coal free by 2030, if not sooner. Utilities, states, cities, companies, banks, insurers, and individuals are turning their backs on this filthy industry en masse already. It's shrank from about half of generation to the mid 20s in about a decade.

 

[dainthomas]

The uptick in last years's pollution is mostly attributed to the economy and all the wildfires. A trend isn't clear yet. That said this new rule is bullshit. Coal sucks and everybody knows it. I mean it isn't even cheap now that utilities actually have to deal with their aging plants and huge coal ash piles leaking heavy metals into groundwater.

Due to its growing unpopularity and economic disadvantages I think the US will be essentially coal free by 2030, if not sooner. Utilities, states, cities, companies, banks, insurers, and individuals are turning their backs on this filthy industry en masse already. It's shrank from about half of generation to the mid 20s in about a decade.

The utility I work for has already shut down their last coal plant (due in no small part to air pollution lawsuits) and it's been replaced by gas fired (for base load). They're also building wind and solar like crazy.

 

[Indus]

Too bad it would only kill 1400 a year. If they could kill off 14 million that would mean lower taxes. They clearly need to work harder! /sarcasm

 

[senseamp]

Nice to see coal country voting to clean up the gene pool after itself.

 

[DarthKyrie]

Nice to see coal country voting to clean up the gene pool after itself.

While making the environment around toxic to human habitation.

 

[Maxima1]

The uptick in last years's pollution is mostly attributed to the economy and all the wildfires. A trend isn't clear yet. That said this new rule is bullshit. Coal sucks and everybody knows it. I mean it isn't even cheap now that utilities actually have to deal with their aging plants and huge coal ash piles leaking heavy metals into groundwater.

Coal died completely with natural gas and many other technologies are approaching a similar cost to coal. Trying to mitigate coal's problems with pollutants, including CO2 just makes it completely uncompetitive. This shouldn't even be controversial.

 

[Homerboy]

I'm waiting for the announcement that brake pads and clutches will be made out of asbestos and that lead is being reintroduced to gasoline.

Don't forget about lead paint. Beautiful, cheap, clean lead paint. Deregulate everything! There's money to be made!!!!

 

[ondma]

Yea, I wish when Trump touts how great the economy is, the Dems would counter with what is the cost in pollution and the increased deficit from the wealthy/corporate tax cuts.
Unfortunately a lot of people are unwilling to accept the long view, even if it is pointed out to them.

 

[K1052]

The utility I work for has already shut down their last coal plant (due in no small part to air pollution lawsuits) and it's been replaced by gas fired (for base load). They're also building wind and solar like crazy.

Lawsuits have been a key way to bring many units to a close especially when they lack modern emissions controls.

If people want to blame the government for the decline of coal they should look to the SO2 and MATS rules. Not allowing coal fired generators to externalize their costs had a remarkable effect on the industry. Cheap natural gas and now renewables coming online at about the same time is the death blow.

 

[BoomerD]

Lawsuits have been a key way to bring many units to a close especially when they lack modern emissions controls.

If people want to blame the government for the decline of coal they should look to the SO2 and MATS rules. Not allowing coal fired generators to externalize their costs had a remarkable effect on the industry. Cheap natural gas and now renewables coming online at about the same time is the death blow.

The demand for cheap natural gas is the cause of all the fracking that's causing so many problems across the country. Poisoned/flammable water' earthquakes in places that historically don't have them, pumping waste into the wells, etc.

 

[K1052]

The demand for cheap natural gas is the cause of all the fracking that's causing so many problems across the country. Poisoned/flammable water' earthquakes in places that historically don't have them, pumping waste into the wells, etc.

Fracking does have a lot of environmental problems, no doubt. The practice was probably reasonable safe if properly regulated but I don't have much confidence that it really ever was...certainly not now under this admin.

I'd like to see a transition to all zero carbon energy as soon as possible. Keep the nukes online for baseload even at a premium for another decade or two. Move everything else to wind/solar plus short term storage.

 

[Brainonska511]

I'd like to see a transition to all zero carbon energy as soon as possible. Keep the nukes online for baseload even at a premium for another decade or two. Move everything else to wind/solar plus short term storage.

Me too. I wish it was economically and politically feasible to build new nuclear plants in the US. At least renewables are competitive with traditional energy sources. A few months ago, I switched my MA energy provider to a 100% renewable one. Costs a whole 3¢ more per kWh compared to my city's municipal aggregate rate, but still slightly cheaper than the local utility's general rate.

 

[cytg111]

Headline : Trump kills 1400 coal miners.

 

[zinfamous]

Don't forget about lead paint. Beautiful, cheap, clean lead paint. Deregulate everything! There's money to be made!!!!

I'm convinced that there are at least 3 users on here that will go to the grave still arguing that lead is perfectly safe and that the "Evil science campaign against lead!" in the 60s and 70s was a liberal plot to destroy the auto industry. Science bad!

You can pretty much tell because they still argue against all of the absolute facts regarding climate change, CO2, coal, all of this nonsense. They are literally the same people, they never learn a fucking thing from the obvious stupidity of the past, and they are essentially marked targets of industry propagandists that know they will have a dependable base of support when they need to lobby $$$millions to defend brainless, expensive, poisonous internal practices in order to prop up a short-term growth of maybe 2-3% per year because they are too lazy to fucking update standards and abandon destructive and wasteful practices despite the reality of far better returns in the long term.

It has always been this way.

 

[K1052]

Me too. I wish it was economically and politically feasible to build new nuclear plants in the US. At least renewables are competitive with traditional energy sources. A few months ago, I switched my MA energy provider to a 100% renewable one. Costs a whole 3¢ more per kWh compared to my city's municipal aggregate rate, but still slightly cheaper than the local utility's general rate.

Yeah I pay 3/4ths of a cent premium per kWh for all wind energy from my utility. They have a reasonably aggressive plan to shift their generation portfolio away from coal and gas but I figure every little bit of demand from consumers helps.

 

[Zorba]

The demand for cheap natural gas is the cause of all the fracking that's causing so many problems across the country. Poisoned/flammable water' earthquakes in places that historically don't have them, pumping waste into the wells, etc.

I've had to deal with the earthquakes. Sometimes having 50 3.0-4.5 magnitude earthquakes in a weekend, epicenterred less than 5 miles from me. That is from waste water injection, not fracking. Luckily after we had a 5.0 6 miles from my house, along a fault line that could produce a 6.5+ and runs right under downtown OKC, Oklahoma started shutting down injection wells and our earthquakes have dropped way off, only have felt a few since then after feeling probably over 500 in a few year span.

From my understanding, most of the waste water is actually coming from traditional wells. Oklahoma's wells produce a lot of water. Around the same time horizontal drilling was taking off, someone invited a much cheaper and better way to separate the oil and water. Therefore, lots of wells that were previously uneconomical were turned back on, massively increasing the load into injection wells.

BTW: Fracking has been around for a very long time. The "new" fracking is horizontal drilling with fracking.