Killing Coal

Looks like Obozo wrote off West Virginia a while back.

Alpha Natural Resources announced Tuesday its plan to cut the positions and scale back coal production by 16 million tons annually — which would result in eight mine closings in Virginia, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Four-hundred workers will be laid off immediately, though the company reportedly may try to re-hire some of the 1,200.

Kevin Crutchfield, the company’s chief executive officer, said the lay-offs and the closings of the non-union mines are the result a difficult market in which power plants are switching to abundant, less-expensive natural gas and “a regulatory environment that’s aggressively aimed at constraining the use of coal.”  --Owens quoting Fox News

Clearly, natgas is a better buy, for the time being.  But things have a habit of reverting to the mean, and Obozo's war on coal will prove costly.