Coal Plants Produce Cheap Energy—But There’s a Catch

We often talk about the “externalities” of the energy from fossil fuel resources; it’s a term in economics describing the costs involved in a certain transaction that are not captured by the parties involved in the transaction itself.  In the case of energy, it refers to the fact that what we’re currently paying for a kilowatt-hour of electricity produced by coal, for instance, fails to take into consideration enormous costs to human health and the environment. 

In fact, burning coal and selling the resultant electricity at a low price is the poster child for this entire concept on externalities.  Coal produces huge CO2 emissions, but also CH4, oxides of sulfur and nitrogen, arsenic, cadmium, selenium, mercury, and a wide variety of radioactive isotopes.  Burning coal killed over a million people last year alone, not to mention what it did to acidify the oceans and drive an unprecedented number of species into extinction.

Here’s an article that tells the story of a few states in the western part of the U.S. that have had enough of this unfairness, and want the companies that operate coal-fired power plants to reimburse the victims for the damage.