Reposted by Brian Tanis
Facts worth repeating:
It would be cheaper to pay the ~40,000 or so people employed by the coal industry $1M a year to do nothing than to pay for the health damages (not including climate change) caused by burning coal in the U.S.
publichealth.hsc.wvu.edu/news/story?h...
publichealth.hsc.wvu.edu
Counting up the costs of coal
Regular readers know that WVU’s Dr. Michael Hendryx has done work on that issue (subscription required), reporting that:
![4-panel comic. (1) [Three people. The person on the left has shoulder-length hair; the person on the right has a white hat.] PERSON 1: I’m sad that we missed the Perseids. PERSON 2 with hat: There’s still the Geminids. PERSON 1: Yeah, but they’re in December. (2) PERSON 1: The Perseids happen when it’s warm enough to lie outside with a blanket, and we found a good mosquito-free beach. So we just lie around watching the stars and eating snacks. One year we saw the aurora. (3) PERSON 3 with shoulder-length hair: You know, I think I heard that the Perseids might be late this year. PERSON 2: Yeah, actually, I heard that too. (4) Later… [Three people lying down gazing up at stars in dark sky. One meteor is in the sky.] PERSON 3: Hm, seems like a normal number of meteors. Guess I heard wrong. PERSON 1: Maybe the Perseids are *next* weekend. PERSON 2: Oh, good thinking. Let’s come back then, just in case.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:cz73r7iyiqn26upot4jtjdhk/bafkreia2nfobiit5kmashzqken2545vvocu5wjnchfzw62yzvixksgunya)
