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Why has the world started to mine coal again? (lemmy.ml)
submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml
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With climate change looming, it seems so completely backwards to go back to using it again.

Is it coal miners pushing to keep their jobs? Fear of nuclear power? Is purely politically motivated, or are there genuinely people who believe coal is clean?

Edit, I will admit I was ignorant to the usage of coal nowadays.

Now I'm more depressed than when I posted this

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[–] 9 points 2 years ago (2 children)
  • Fukushima
  • Chernobyl
  • 3-Mile Island to name a few
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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Yes yes, we know people don't understand statistics.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    If you're referring to the nukes-are-statistically-safe argument, then to be fair, you also have to take into account the scale of their failures.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago

    Right it would be something involving number of people harmed, for number of joules or watt-hours of energy produced. How much injury, death, etc is there on a per-unit basis. That would be how you'd get a probability of harm. Then you could compare it numerically with other forms of energy to see which is the safest, statistically speaking.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    I want to add, it also take a while to get it going and the upfront costs are several billions of dollars. There also needs to be some kind of training or something to get the right personnel.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    And it’s a long project that will span multiple administrations, leading to low certainty of project completion. As long as it’s a political wedge issue the support can’t be relied upon throughout the project.

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