Coal supplies almost half of our nation’s electricity and more than 20% of our nation’s total energy consumption. Without coal our entire economy would crumble. Despite decades of subsidies, wind and solar power contribute only 1% of our nation’s energy needs. Despite these facts, Joe Biden told a voter in Ohio today: “No coal plants here in America. Build them, if they’re going to build them, over there. Make them clean.” Watch below:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rXyTRT-NZg[/youtube]
Leaving aside the fact that Biden is, at best, forgetting that Barack Obama is on record supporting clean coal, the statement just shows again how completely out of touch with reality the left is on energy.
In the video above, Biden mentions that China is building coal plants. That is true. In 2006 alone, China completed enough coal power plants to match all of Britain’s capacity. But what Biden didn’t mention, is that despite signing the Kyoto Protocol, countries across Europe are rapidly building new coal power plants. Germany plans to build 27 coal-fired plants by 2020. Italy plans to increase its reliance on coal from 14% today to 33% in just five years. In all of Europe, 40 new major coal power are set to be built in the next five years.
Right now the U.S. has 760 gigawatts of power to meet consumption. We will need 135 gigawatts of new capacity over the next decade to keep the lights on, but right now only 57 gigawatts of power are planned. American cities will go dark unless we add new coal power plants. Those are the cold hard facts.