“Coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, is the crack cocaine of the developing world.”(Zarembo 1). Yet coal use is not only an addiction of the developing world; this cheap and abundant fuel is also addicting to industrialized countries such as the United States of America. The United States has been using this fuel constantly since the 1740’s where coal use started in Virginia. But coal has a much deeper history with the human race as a whole; coal has been proven to have been used by the Romans in England since 100-200 AD during their occupation of the island. Mankinds addiction enmass really started during late 18th and early 19th centuries, with the Industrial Revolution, when it powered the machines that allowed western countries to modernize. Coal use had been decreasing in use since its peak in the Industrial Revolution thanks to gas and oil, but since the 1970’s coal is seeing a comeback across the world thanks to a lessening of oil and gas reserves. The threat of global warming and the consequences it will bring, as well as the deaths caused by the burning of coal, only presents more pressure to stop coal’s use. Still these effects are not the only ones, coal also hurts the environment through its mining and burning. Strip mining causes erosion, loss of habitat, and dust pollution to name a few(Environmental Literacy Council). Even after all these harmful effects some people still feel that coal has positives that gives coal its desire to be used. This use of coal and especially its increase cannot continue because coal is a direct cause of global warming; and a threat in other ways which outweighs its benefits. Therefore we should not consider coal as an option to be used as a resource and instead turn to nuclear power a much-feared alternative that is actually much better.

Global warming has been defined as a gradual warming of the earth’s atmosphere and has been attributed to two different causes: one side believing humans are the cause and the other that this is naturally caused. The side that believes that humans are the cause of global warming is the majority. The majority of the scientific community, which met to discuss this issue Feb 2, 2007 in Paris, supports this position. The conclusion this conference came to was that “global warming is “unequivocal” and that human activity is the main driver” (“NY Times”). It has been proven that since the industrial revolution there has been an increase in the temperature of the earth’s lower atmosphere (Global Warming Pg. 1). The industrial revolution was the first time that mankind had released enough carbon (Ms. Ward), necessary to create a sizeable change in the atmosphere of the earth. From the Industrial Revolution the release of CO2 only increased.

“Coal production in the United States…fed the industrial revolution, and supplied industrial and transportation fuel during the two world wars” (EIA 1). The Environmental Inspection Agency [EIA] tells how the use of coal increased as the need increased over time. As the increase in coal use has occurred so has global warming followed its rise. As the use increased exponentially so did the increases in temperature of the world due to this release of CO2.

Although the majority of scientists believe humans cause global warming there are still others that believe that this heating of the earth is natural, or at least not completely human caused. This group consists of not only companies and organizations that have something to lose from proof that humans are causing global warming but also a very small minority of scientists. Scientists, in the group, taking this position do not have any real or definitive proof of it being natural or not entirely human caused. Many of these said scientists are on the payrolls of multi-national corporations that are heavily invested in the fossil fuel exploitation business. These scientists do not realize the implications that their misguided support for only special interest groups has for if they did there would be no way they could possibly continue their stance. If coal use continues it will increase global warming. Increased global warming promises major environmental and geographical changes. According to BBC, Bangladesh a country of 150 million people could lose 37% of its landmass alone from rising ocean levels created by melting polar ice caps. It could also cause even more deaths due to heat stroke and famine, yet coal use not only causes these tragedies but also has health threats of its own.

Coal use is not only affecting us through its warming of the environment, but through the negative health effects it has on miners and on people living around coal facilities as well. The effects that coal has on miners through things such, as air particle inhalation causing black lung disease, is very serious and harmful. Black lung disease alone can lower the life expectancy and potential life of coal miners that contract it.

According to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, in 2002 a total of 7,969 active and retired coal miners lost 5-10 years off of their total life expectancy. The Institute also found out through studies of coal miners that out of 6,914 active miners surveyed 112 had black lung disease or 1.6% of the miners. If this 1.6% is taken out of the total coal miner population of 104,824, this adds up to a little more than 1,667 miners having black lung disease.

But these respiratory illnesses do not only affect coal miners, they also harm those who live around coal facilities, such as power plants. According to scientists from the researching firm BNET Research attributed 13,900 asthma attacks and 460,000 incidents of upper respiratory symptoms to nine coal burning power plants in the state of Illinois. This is a huge human health cost that could be avoided through not using coal as a potential option and therefore making the air less polluted causing less respiratory illnesses. To take the place of coal in the electricity industry nuclear power could suffice. It does not pollute the atmosphere causing these upper respiratory symptoms to almost be erased due to lack of pollution. Nuclear power is the better choice as an option due solely to this improvement in the everyday life of average Americans. Without coal being used, tens of thousands could have the plague of asthma lessened drastically and others would not contract asthma in the future. These health issues should be a cause for great concern, but this does not even tell of the worst that coal inflicts on people.

Coal can do much worse things than cause asthma it also kills; scores of miners die every year from the pollution coal creates pollution. In a count by USA Today in 2006, 47-coal miners died as a result of mining disasters and malfunctions. Many of these very deaths would be avoided if there were not such a high demand for coal. This demand for coal could be drastically lessened if nuclear power were used due to coal main market the electricity industry being replaced by nuclear power. If this occurred then there would be less focus on output and more on safety, not to mention scores less coal miners would be put into these dangerous environments.

The miner’s deaths are tragic, but the innocent lives of premature babies being lost is reprehensible. Angela Anderson of Clear the Air, an activist organization trying to reduce smog, has used Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] methodology attributed the premature deaths of 24,000 babies to the enormous pollution that coal plants exude. Sadly though, many of these innocent lives could be saved “If all coal fired plants reduced their emissions by 75%, a technically achievable goal that most old power plants have dodged”(“Clean Coal”). But the only way all these lives would be spared is through not considering coal a viable option.

Even much dreaded nuclear power has a substantially lower death toll in comparison to coal. Coal killed 24,000 premature children and scores of miners are dying yearly. According to the U.S. Department of Labor from 1936 – 2006 36,594 miners have died and hundreds of thousands were injured. In comparison the worst nuclear disaster in history Chernobyl killed 58 people from the moment it melted down up to 15 years later (EuroNews).

The human costs are shocking but the negative effects on the environment are absolutely appalling; a new and increasing method of mining coal is called mountain top removal mining. Mountaintops are removed by dynamite and bulldozers, the coal is then extracted and the remaining soil is placed in a nearby valley and called “reclaimed land” (Mountain Justice Summer). Out of mountaintop removal mining, underground mining, and strip mining this is the worst, destroying not only mountain environments and habitat, but also those of the valley that are filled in. Yet this is not the only damage as a result of valleys being filled in miles of river that run through them are buried and according to an Interior Department report 724 miles of river could be filled by 2018. The destroying and blocking of rivers harms the environment by creating swamps and wetlands out of woodland and downstream killing wetlands due to lack of water.

Although mountain top removal mining is very destructive, a much older method rivals it as the worst. Strip mining is a method that removes soil and rock overburden on top of a coal seam in order to access the coal (Britannica). This method destroys vast areas of land and wildlife habitat by altering the geography and destroying all vegetation. Due to lax federal laws on land reclamation, allowing companies to not treat polluted soil, for example after the mining is finished and the topsoil is replaced, the environment of the said area will never be the same. Polluted and prone to erosion it is almost impossible for “reclaimed” to be active environmentally or to function as a habitat. Plants have difficulty growing there and without plants there is no ecosystem necessary for wildlife to thrive.

Yet above ground mining is not the only type that causes issues with the environment, underground mining creates large amounts of slurry or mine water runoff. This sludge, which is toxic waste in all but name, is usually kept in above poorly created dams of which according to Reclaim Democracy, there are 700 of in the United States (Reclaim Democracy). This waste kills all animals and plants around its impoundments, not to mention drastically affecting groundwater purity causing the slurry to affect environmental conditions for miles. In comparison to nuclear power, which is stored underground safely and does not contaminate groundwater or hurt wildlife. Nuclear power plants are also required to keep track of all pollution while coal is not required to (EPA). These effects are felt when the dams or above ground impoundments are doing their jobs. When they fail, which they do with regularity due to lax federal standards on dams, they dump millions of gallons of waste into not only the surrounding lands, but also water ways, impacting everything downstream. If there weren’t so much coal being mined these environmental problems would be much less and possibly even non-existent.

Coal still has advocates despite all of its faults, damage to health and the environment; people pushing the positive reasons that the coal should and needs to be an option if not the main one. One major reason that advocates push for the use of coal is energy policy. “America’s reserves account for 35% of the world’s known recoverable coal, the largest total of any single nation (Coal Supply). The energy policy or the administrations desire for energy independence has pushed coal to the forefront as the fuel that will give us this goal. Given the sheer volume that the United States has some say ask why should it not be used? They favor coal so the United States is not dependent on a volatile Middle East for as much fossil fuels. If coal were not in use to produce electricity “we would have had to import the energy equivalent of an additional 10 million barrels of oil a day” (Fact Sheet). What is not mentioned is how nuclear power could be used to make up the difference causing much less pollution at around the same price, also with fewer deaths. Another over touted virtue of coal is its reliability as a source. “At current production levels, proven coal reserves are estimated to last 147 years” (Coal Facts 2007). This figure is wrong, much of this supposed available coal is not economically viable to use. The last supposed virtue of coal is that it is cheap. Coal is the least expensive fossil fuel and the least expensive way to create electricity in the world. But given its environmental and health impacts, is it truly or are the costs just somewhere else maybe not in cents per kilowatt but through the health of our people and our planet? Nuclear power is much safer and ready to take coal’s place as our electricity provider. Not only does it improve the health of the environment and humans it does an enormous amount to halt global warming due to its low CO2 output.

The use of coal and the increase in its use must stop due to its impacts on the environment, people, and our planet as a whole. As anyone can see coal is not a viable option its cost are too great and its benefits too little. Nuclear power should be used instead due to it being the practical opposite of coal. Nuclear power is clean and as a result friendly to the environment, people, and our planet. Some talk of clean coal but in all truth there is no such thing and to believe so is ludicrous. Coal is a destroyer of our people, environment, and planet and despite its virtues of energy independence, reliability, and cheapness it is not and should not be considered a viable option for the future of mankind. It is and should always be regarded as a relic of mankind’s past.