Quote

Assuming normal winter weather, we currently anticipate the coal markets to remain difficult through 2015; while we always strive to operate a full capacity in this environment, it may be necessary to delay our production growth to match the market.

Even the biggest coal boosters have long admitted that coal is a dying industry - the fight has always been over how fast and how hard the industry will fall.

You have to recognize what the markets are doing, what the rules and regulations are doing, and all the more reasons that we've got to find some more solutions in particular with coal.

Further, the United States is moving ahead in the development of clean coal technology. There are vast coal reserves in our country, and when it is burned cleanly, coal can provide a resource to supply a large amount of our energy requirements.

I think we'll still be operating coal in 2030. Whether we will be in 2040, I think, is a question, or in 2050.

The coal industry is a huge industry when we're talking about polluting the environment, our air and our waterways.

The relevant questions now are: How do we move beyond coal? How do we bring new jobs to the coal fields and retrain coal miners for other work? How do we inspire entrepreneurialism and self-reliance in people whose lives have been dependent on the paternalistic coal industry?

The coal mining industry is very destructive and it doesn't have to be.

If coal is going to be used, the only response - because it is the dirtiest of all fuels - is that we have to learn how to do carbon capture and storage and we have to learn how to do it quickly on a commercial scale.

I do believe that the coal industry sees the cultural shift toward cleaner energy and global warming solutions as a threat to their interests.