NATURAL GAS TOPS COAL AS US ENERGY SOURCE

(07/14/2015)

Natural gas has now topped coal as the biggest source of U.S. electric power for the first time. The market shift has been ongoing for years, with the price of natural gas low and new regulations making coal more risky for power generators. Thirty-one percent of electric power generation now comes from natural gas, and 30 percent from coal, according to a recently released report using data from the U.S. Energy Department. A US drilling boom starting in 2008 has boosted US energy, making the United States the world's biggest combined producer of oil and natural gas. Hydraulic fracturing has allowed energy companies to tap huge gas deposits, a process that raised numerous environmental concerns. The price of natural gas is about a third of what it was 10 years ago. WV has long been fighting Obama's "War on Coal," related to climate change, but the decline of coal in the Mountain State is also linked to market forces. The state's economy has long been based on coal. Power companies have been installing more natural gas, retiring older coal-fired facilities. New regulations that aim to restrict the emission of greenhouse gasses, and the risk that more are on the way, have added pressure to make the switch. The burning of natural gas produces carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides, but less than coal. Congressional Republicans have vowed to block the Clean Power Act and some GOP governors have said their states will not comply, essentially calling Climate Change an act or nature, or in some cases calling it a hoax.

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