Not many people are aware of the scope and depth of new regulations that are being set on industry in general. This is not just true in the coal industry, but I use coal as an example to show how over-regulating anything creates issues and how these regulations are in other words going to destroy the coal industry in the US. While most opponents of AGW are focusing on the science or on laws, the current president has set into stone regulations through the EPA and other organizations that make in impossible to make a profit today in opening up new coal plants (and other industry) through mostly blunt instruments that do nothing but destroy the ability of coal to function.
I discussed a little bit about this in how President Obama wants to “bankrupt coal” in a previous blog post as far as how it does not work economically: Right here.
Here is a map of the actual closures slated for the next 10-15 years:
As it should be noted, these closures are spread out in many different areas of the country.