There’s a number of reasons why subsidizing the development and use of liquefied coal are bad, and some of them are mentioned in this story about the coal industry’s lobbying of Congress—it won’t cut greenhouse emissions an iota; it also would wholly bypass markets with longterm price guarantees and insurance policies against failure. Of course, coal companies are notorious bad actors when it comes to subverting markets with subsidies and ignoring regulations with bankruptcy, so it’s no surprise at all they’re trying it still. (It is surprising, however, and frustrating that good Midwestern senators, like Barack Obama, and former senators like Dick Gephardt are in the companies’ favor. Aren’t they busy enough running up the price of corn?) Not mentioned is the most damning of all costs, the destruction of Appalachia through mountaintop mining, which harms not only the social landscape of the region but also devastates its biodiversity and pollutes the groundwater and land for generations.

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