In his Guardian column, Graham Readfearn touches on the history of one of the most recent and most backwards denier talking points: "Coal is the moral choice." Yes, according to some, supporting a fuel source shown to kill thousands of people a year is moral, as long as it means energy is cheap (and there are profits to be made).
Although various incarnations of the energy poverty argument have existed for a while, its recent surge in popularity seems to have kicked off last year, when Marc Morano went to congratulate Australians for stepping back from climate action. Since then, Tony Abbott has said that, "coal is good for humanity;" the Aussie treasurer Joe Hockey claimed that, "we export coal to lift nations out of poverty;" and the Finance Minister simply stated "coal is good."
Now "good" can have plenty of meanings, but we're not sure it fits with coal's track record. In the EU alone, the biggest 300 coal power plants cause an estimated 22,300 premature deaths annually. In India, one report estimates that coal-fired power plants caused around 100,000 deaths from 2011-2012. In China, one study found that air pollution (which is mainly caused by coal) was responsible for 1.2 million deaths in 2010, while another study found that air pollution will cause the loss of an aggregate 2.5 billion life-years for 500 million people.
All this begs the question for Morano and other morally bankrupt coal-pushers: is electricity worth the cost of human life? Is it moral to give someone a gift that may kill them, sicken their children and potentially render the planet uninhabitable?
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