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Comment by cleverjake | Hacker News Reader

A common argument against renewable energy pushes is how it hurts the coal jobs - at least in areas like pennsylvania, kentucky, and west virginia. A "they're tryna take er jerbs" argument is a good way to get voters out against it when most people are in the industry, or have parents, siblings, inlaws, or relatives that would loose a job if that happened.

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Interesting. None of those states would seem high on the list of states with great potential for renewables (too dense for wind, not enough sun or open space for solar). But if you could hack that--for instance, offer clean, less-dangerous aboveground jobs at comparable or better wages--wouldn't the workers flock to them?

The deep-pocketed, lobbying mine owners on the other hand...

Maybe the hack is for those states to get the mine owners established in the manufacturing supporting renewables. Smooth transition, ready workforce.

There's opportunity for solar in pretty much all states, and if not solar, then other forms of renewable energy, conservation measures, or activity.

I would expect to see large concentrated solar installations in sunbelt states though.

> Maybe the hack is for those states to get the mine owners established in the manufacturing supporting renewables. Smooth transition, ready workforce.

Those states will bend over backwards to accommodate the coal industry, but they're not going to put any programs together for the actual workers. You would need either a non-profit or a renewables industrialist (Elon?) to put a program together to train and/or relocate these workers to better jobs.

Yeah, I don't expect the typical OSHA-ignoring mine owner to adapt to a new economy, and they probably have achieved enough regulatory capture to keep out competing tech, but state lines are porous, and labor is relatively mobile, so if opportunity beckons across state lines, economic rationality may prevail.

So states bordering coal states--the ball is in your court!

I see plenty of wind farms and rigs on the interstate transporting large turbines to Iowa and Kansas, so maybe the labor will reallocate.

I'm of the mind that we should be making an active effort to recruit coal miners into the renewable industry; there's a whole lot of wind turbines and solar capacity left to install, and those are much safer, healthy, and I'd argue better paying jobs that the coal industry.

I'm biased though, and think the coal industry should be starved of resources as quickly as possible.

> None of those states would seem high on the list of states with great potential for renewables (too dense for wind, not enough sun or open space for solar).

Oh, I don't know. I would think the tops of mountains that have been scraped off for coal would be good places for wind projects, or solar arrays. It would be kind of poetic.

If anything is taking away mining jobs, its machines like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagger_288

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