As the clock strikes midnight on the year 2020, we are hopeful that the end of the COVID-19 pandemic is near, and we pray for the safety and health of all Americans.
While the pandemic and market forces contributed to record low coal production in 2020, the industry has experienced modest recovery over the past three and a half years under the Trump Administration.
The Administration, to include leadership in the US Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency, has worked to place the industry on stable regulatory footing, protect the industry’s electric generation market share, and engaged in research and development of new technologies to extend the viability of this vital resource. As an industry, we are thankful for these efforts.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The West Virginia Coal Association is endorsing West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey for U.S. Senate in the 2018 General Election.
“Since he took office, General Morrisey has been a tireless advocate for West Virginia’s coal industry,” WVCA President Bill Raney said. “He fought for us against the Obama Administration, which was using every tool available to try and end coal mining in the United States. We know Patrick Morrisey will continue to fight for West Virginia coal as a member of the U.S. Senate, working in tandem with President Donald Trump.”
Raney said incumbent Sen. Joe Manchin also has been a longtime friend of coal, but Morrisey’s bold actions to protect the livelihoods of thousands of West Virginia coal miners deserves to be recognized.
“He not only waged legal battles against the previous administration on behalf of West Virginia’s coal industry, he corralled an incredibly impressive army of attorneys general in other states to protect mining and coal-fired electric power,” Raney said. “That action led to an unprecedented stay against Obama’s EPA and his so-called ‘Clean Power Plan’ at the U.S. Supreme Court, saving many coal miners’ jobs while the Trump Administration works to reissue a more balanced regulatory proposal.”
CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The West Virginia Coal Association is praising President Donald Trump for issuing a new domestic energy plan that will replace the Obama-era “clean power plan” that would have decimated the American coal industry.
“The good news just keeps on coming from the Trump Administration,” WVCA President Bill Raney said. “And for this good news to come on a day when he will be visiting West Virginia makes it even more significant because our coalfields were ground zero for the Obama Administration’s war on coal. It will be an honor to be in Charleston tonight with President Trump when he announces his plans to replace the Obama “Costly Power Plan” with a true domestic energy policy that will protect American jobs.”
During Trump’s rally at the Charleston Civic Center tonight, the president is expected to highlight the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s replacement of the Clean Power Plan (CPP), an Obama-era set of regulations that would have made it far more difficult, if not impossible, to use coal as a fuel source for electricity in the United States and put thousands of our coal miners out of work.
The EPA is replacing the CPP with a more reasonable set of regulations that still will aim to reduce carbon dioxide air emissions, relying on plant-by-plant evaluations to determine the best path forward for individual facilities to increase efficiency and lower emissions, rather than seizing control of the nation’s entire electric grid from the power plant to the wall plug.
“The coal industry has proven time and again that we are the best environmentalists out there,” Raney said. “U.S. coal plants have reduced toxic air emissions by more than 90 percent over the last few decades. We are committed to continuing to make improvements while protecting America’s domestic energy security and, most importantly, to keep our West Virginians working.”
West Virginia is headed in the right direction and there is much to celebrate. Our unemployment rate is low, job growth is high, we anticipate a budget surplus for the first time in years and our workforce participation rate is improving. And this is just the beginning.
Our teachers received a historic raise. We are seeing an incredible amount of infrastructure development. Road and bridge construction is underway at an unprecedented rate and multiple interstate natural gas pipelines are being developed, which will help grow our state’s gas industry and the jobs it provides.
Gov. Jim Justice is leading the charge with President Donald Trump to assure mining and power plant jobs are retained in West Virginia. The Trump-Justice Plan will ensure the safety of America’s power grid while helping grow our economy here at home.
