“Adapting to the Future”

by Rushi Patel

Recent economic and political discourse has spurred the revitalization of the fossil fuel industry in America. President Trump promised to bring back coal jobs in the 2016 election year, and he has succeeded in the expansion of the coal industry 7 months into his term. However, I believe the expansion and revitalization of the coal comes at the expense of early investment into the clean power industry and is misguided as it places short-term employability ahead of long-term ecological sustainability and economic security for its workers.

     I am without a doubt personally extremely far removed from this issue. I live in a comfortable ranch house in a suburb of Chicago with my two business owner parents. I haven’t done a day of true labor in my life. That being said, I am currently being educated by individuals who are intelligent in their own right, and their influence has instilled common sense upon me and an understanding of how the world works. Attempting to save a doomed ship is ludicrous.

            The United States has recently pulled out of the international Paris Agreement which sought to limit ozone depletion and global warming, with President Trump citing the coal industry’s destruction as a reason for this decision. While this decision might lessen perceived international pressure to diminish our coal mining, in practice the United States has been set back behind our competitors in the emerging industry of clean energy. To secure the continued ecological viability of Earth, the international community has decided the shift focus from fossil fuels as humanity’s primary power source to cleaner and sustainable hydro, solar, and wind energy. Extensive research and development has been poured into this new industry with countries like India and China making huge advances. With this rise in clean energy comes jobs in the form of power plant workers, research and development, maintenance and construction. Despite the delay in this industry’s rise in America due to our insistence that the coal industry is to be revitalized, America will still eventually have to adapt to our circumstances and join in the industry. When this happens, however, we will be far behind our biggest economic competitors. Politician’s and coal baron’s insistence that fossil fuels continue to be used will arbitrarily hold us back from being the leaders in this new industry--not to mention the extensive revenue that private and government institutions collect.

            This focus on the coal industry actually works against coal miners. Eventually, coal mines will be shut down and those workers will be without work. They are trading long-term employability with a short-term employment with which workers are familiar. The work in a coal mine is a simple, yet arduous job that does not require high education of the employees. This, in turn, will make them unemployable in the modern market and they will be unable to find jobs elsewhere. Training these miners in the work of the new industry and securing their long-term employment in the clean energy industry will be to their economic and social benefit.

            The refusal to adapt to the future in energy will set the United States back politically and economically for several years. While the expansion of the coal industry will be great in creating a short-term influx of jobs and job security for the workers, it is inevitable that the mines and power plants will be closed down in favor of the future industry and their narrow skillset will make coal miners un-hireable in other fields. The coal industry also hurts the Earth the most as we destroy environments for coal, deplete the ozone layer with our coal burning which hastens global warming and leaves human civilization on an ever-dwindling nonrenewable resource. It shouldn't take a 16-year old suburban high school kid to tell you that trying to revive an increasingly obsolete industry will not succeed.

            There are potential solutions for the workers and families primarily affected by the coal industry’s problems. BitSource is a Kentucky based company that specializes in training former coal miner computer software languages like CSS and JavaScript. This training gives these workers and their families an opportunity for an economically secure life. I propose that the government provide re-education programs such BitSource in many field to employ the hard-working coal miners into more productive fields, perhaps even the clean energy industry itself.

Patel, Prachi. “The Kentucky Startup That Is Teaching Coal Miners to Code.” IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News, IEEE Spectrum, 15 Feb. 2017, spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/fossil-fuels/the-kentucky-startup-that-is-teaching-coal-miners-to-code.