COLSTRIP — After several years of taking a beating from the poor economy, new pollution rules and a flood of cheap natural gas, the coal industry was on the rebound this year as mining projects moved forward in the Western U.S. and demand for the fuel began to rise, especially in Asia.
But almost overnight, coal is back on the defensive, scrambling to stave off a dark future amid President Barack Obama's renewed push to rein in climate change.
The proposal, with its emphasis on cuts in carbon dioxide emissions from new and existing power plants, would put facilities like the 2,100 megawatt Colstrip electricity plant in eastern Montana in regulators' cross hairs. That has profound spin-off implications for the massive strip mines that dot the surrounding arid landscape of the Powder River Basin and provide the bulk of the nation's coal.
Montana's sole member of the U.S. House of Representatives bluntly declared that the administration had decided to "pick winners and losers" in the energy sector with its plan. "He wants to move toward shutting down the coal industry," Republican Rep. Steve Daines said of the president.C'mon, flat earth in Montana? Where? The great empiricist apparently doesn't even bother to look out the window of his plane during the many presidential flyovers.
Air Force One Takeoff From Bozeman/Yellowstone Airport, See The Mountains Dude.
There is hardly a flat space to be found, not anywhere in the state. My God, the state is named after mountains.
The name Montana comes from the Spanish word Montaña, meaning "mountain", or more broadly, "mountainous country". Montaña del Norte was the name given by early Spanish explorers to the entire mountainous region of the west. The name Montana was added to a bill by the United States House Committee on Territories...The Hill says Obama is mocking his critics. They are too kind. It is about time this mocking bird doesn't fly.
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