Yesterday’s Marketplace report does an excellent job of highlighting the social and political fissures occurring in West Virginia and nationally as the United States starts in earnest the transition to a clean-energy, low-carbon economy. What the story fails to adequately convey is just how many old-line energy producers have crossed the divide and embraced the reality and opportunity of capping and reducing greenhouse gas pollution.
Don Blankenship, who was quoted in the story, is very much a minority voice in the coal industry. His company, Massey Energy, is in fact not even among the top four coal producers nationally, much less internationally. His views on climate change are considered to be extreme even among the coal industry.
Better for Marketplace to highlight the work of Mike Morris of American Electric Power, among the nation’s largest electric utilities and the largest consumer of coal in the Western Hemisphere. Today, AEP is cutting the ribbon on a large demonstration of carbon capture and storage technology in West Virginia, a technology Blankenship dismisses out of hand. AEP is also investing in wind generation even as it works to keep coal relevant in a low-carbon economy.
Those of us who know Morris know he is no bleeding heart — he is as flinty as they come. Yet, in supporting national clean energy cap and trade carbon legislation, and in matching his advocacy with investments in low-carbon technology, he is demonstrating the kind of leadership that West Virginia and the nation need.
Marketplace should do a better job appreciating just how increasingly irrelevant folks like Blankenship are to the national conversation about our clean energy future.
Updated 11/2: Corrected to remove references to NPR. Marketplace is produced by American Public Media.
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