Why is nobody burning coal ???

No, now you are talking about quanity purchased. I find that in anything--lets say, sheetrock. If I go to LOWES & buy, say 10 sheets, I'm going to pay the same as if I just bought one. Now, if I were to buy 100-200 sheets, and have, I've gone to the manager & gotten a break because of the quanity. It doesn't cost them anymore to have 10 or 100 sheets. It's just the way it is. A boat huh?? My 1/2 brother built a Chinese junk up in Maine many yrs ago. I helped him out & upon completion we threw the Harleys aboard & did the inter-coastal, finally ending up in Costa Rica. Pretty outstanding 2 yr venture but I found out that at heart, I'm a land-lubber & was damn glad to disembark when we got back to Fla..

morso wrote:Yes I can understand it is very expensive to ship and sell coal, but as somebody mentioned he almost preferred coal for home use to remain a secret, so that the yuppies did not jump on the band wagon and push the prices up, I thought that the way it was supposed to work, was the more people wanted a product the more suppliers would be in the market, the more competitive the price.
I live on a boat most of the time so can not store much coal, so I have to by my coal by the bag, It is a 40+ mile drive the the coal supplier to buy bag coal? Ok I that that is my problem, The coal supplier bags his own coal why should it matter if I buy 1 bag or 10 to the price I am paying, his cost are the same?

The laws of supply and demand only favor more consumer supply at lower prices and more participating companies in the game of providing that supply while a commodity is readily available and is easily accessible in lock step with the increase in demand. However, anthracite passed its peak of "economically recoverable" production output roughly 85-90 years ago and is a commodity that is in terminal and irreversible decline, and will from here forward only on average yield ever lower quality and grades as each year there is less that is economically and safely mineable.

I think that's why the attitude of secrecy and also the attitude of shutting out and discouraging the non-locals (by means such as not returning inquiring phone calls, not answering inquiring emails, etc...) from taking an interest in purchasing anthracite has arisen within the anthracite mining and supply chain communities. They are shooting themselves in the foot because they truly believe that they have to in order to maintain the 'local' status quo, and perhaps they are correct in so doing, but that is for them alone to decide. Otherwise they would have to smooth out the differential between the phenomenally cheap local and the exorbitantly high longer distance pricing by coming to some sort of middling compromise and raising local pricing while at the same time lowering their longer distance pricing.

freetown fred wrote:No, now you are talking about quanity purchased. I find that in anything--lets say, sheetrock. If I go to LOWES & buy, say 10 sheets, I'm going to pay the same as if I just bought one. Now, if I were to buy 100-200 sheets, and have, I've gone to the manager & gotten a break because of the quanity. It doesn't cost them anymore to have 10 or 100 sheets. It's just the way it is. A boat huh?? My 1/2 brother built a Chinese junk up in Maine many yrs ago. I helped him out & upon completion we threw the Harleys aboard & did the inter-coastal, finally ending up in Costa Rica. Pretty outstanding 2 yr venture but I found out that at heart, I'm a land-lubber & was damn glad to disembark when we got back to Fla..

How big was the Junk. that a interesting choice of boat, any pictures?

It was 56 ft.--3 mast w/ a lil Volvo deisel back up, my bro got the plans from a co. in China--neat part,it draw very little water & at high tide we were able to go into many places, unload the Harleys, get the Junk back out & hang out for a few days. I'll look into the pix question but I doubt it--this was back in the hard drinkin, hard ridin & basically the just back from the Nam & who gives a fk time of my life. I met some real neat people. There is a good number of Boat People out there--FULL TIME--from the IBM 100+ ft. ship for clients to lil houseboats that whole families live on all over the country. Like I said--land-lubber here

morso wrote:

freetown fred wrote:No, now you are talking about quanity purchased. I find that in anything--lets say, sheetrock. If I go to LOWES & buy, say 10 sheets, I'm going to pay the same as if I just bought one. Now, if I were to buy 100-200 sheets, and have, I've gone to the manager & gotten a break because of the quanity. It doesn't cost them anymore to have 10 or 100 sheets. It's just the way it is. A boat huh?? My 1/2 brother built a Chinese junk up in Maine many yrs ago. I helped him out & upon completion we threw the Harleys aboard & did the inter-coastal, finally ending up in Costa Rica. Pretty outstanding 2 yr venture but I found out that at heart, I'm a land-lubber & was damn glad to disembark when we got back to Fla..

How big was the Junk. that a interesting choice of boat, any pictures?

lsayre wrote: However, anthracite passed its peak of "economically recoverable" production output roughly 85-90 years ago and is a commodity that is in terminal and irreversible decline, and will from here forward only on average yield ever lower quality and grades as each year there is less that is economically and safely mineable.

The estimates for recoverable anthracite product is given in billion tons, the key word is recoverable. The fact is there isn't enough demand for it, ever hear of anyone going without coal? We have the seasonal shortages but mid summer the question becomes how many tractor trailers do you want?

I wonder what the current annual production/sales figures are for anthracite in pounds or tons?

lsayre wrote:I wonder what the current annual production/sales figures are for anthracite in pounds or tons?

Link to PA website-

http://www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/deputate ... index.html

2010 is the latest year as 2011 has not ended and been tallied. 5% jump in anthracite tons overall from 2009 to 2010.

People are creatures of habit and are basically lazy. Back in the 40's most people in CT switched to oil so a couple generations have no personal experience with coal. My grandparents form both sides of my family used coal before WW2 and like most transitioned to oil. All that remained of that time was the stories, a couple of Warm Morning surplus barracks heaters and a laundry stove missing the grates. When I got my own home I heated it for 15 plus years with wood with oil backup. Got tired of broken sleep feeding the stove through the winter and scavenging 5 cords of wood each year. I came across an 70's/80's vintage Warm Morning for cheap and hooked it up in my basement. I scavenged coal of a beach on Fisher's Island, out of the dirt at a state park that had been a RR yard back before WW2, coal that had been spilled by dealers in their yards many years ago that no longer sold coal, craigslist, freecycle and I actually bought some from dealers. Took me a while to find that the most economical Reliable source for me was buying it by the tri-axle load direct from PA. Last load (18 ton) came from Harmony. I should be good for 5 or 6 years. Knowing what I know today, I would of bought a nice rice stoker boiler like Mr Precision builds. (Can't do it now.)

During the 1973 oil crisis many people sought out alternative heat source and some bought coal stoves around here at that time, and the other group that had interest was people who bought houses with electric resistance heat. Electric was Soooooo expensive. Those are he two groups I feel kept the supply lines for anthracite open in CT. They had motivation to change. When oil gets expensive enough people will rediscover coal. The green movement will steer most toward pellet stoves and pellets in plastic bags, and get generators to backup the grid power. (Costs about $25 a day to run a generator.) People are funny.

In a nutshell cheap oil killed coal for home heating many years ago.

So that is my take why more people don't burn coal, at least in eastern Connecticut.

steamup wrote:

lsayre wrote:I wonder what the current annual production/sales figures are for anthracite in pounds or tons?

Link to PA website-

http://www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/deputate ... index.html

2010 is the latest year as 2011 has not ended and been tallied. 5% jump in anthracite tons overall from 2009 to 2010.

Thanks for the link steamup! Looks rather flat from 1985 through 2010 overall. The shocker is that bit production is declining and will be at the level of anthracite production within a few generations.

Almost funny isn't it? In my parents day folks burning coal were considered the lazy upper class. They weren't concerned with cutting/splitting/ricking wood, they simply wrote a check to the coal yard. We had 3 tenant houses on the farm and the fact that we provided coal and coal stoves to our tenants was more appealing than indoor plumbing.

Well, we as Americans are lazy. We like everything easier and cleaner. We appear to have more "Disposible Income" than most, so we don't want to be bothered. I never was in that group of the "elite" where I could throw caution to the wind and just use oil or gas or electric. Wood and coal were and are the only way we can afford to heat our home. Our children EXPECT that they never lower themselves to our level and need to use coal or wood. They haven't lived through hard times! Just look at the "Occupy Wall Street" movement. A bunch of spoiled brats; Expecting everything be given to them! Doesn't it make you ill ?
So if you burn coal you wouldn't even fit into a 1% catagory; .001% maybe !

labman wrote:Well, we as Americans are lazy. We like everything easier and cleaner. We appear to have more "Disposible Income" than most, so we don't want to be bothered. I never was in that group of the "elite" where I could throw caution to the wind and just use oil or gas or electric. Wood and coal were and are the only way we can afford to heat our home. Our children EXPECT that they never lower themselves to our level and need to use coal or wood. They haven't lived through hard times! Just look at the "Occupy Wall Street" movement. A bunch of spoiled brats; Expecting everything be given to them! Doesn't it make you ill ?
So if you burn coal you wouldn't even fit into a 1% catagory; .001% maybe !

Well I think you are spot on,I think that people in the Usa do have more Disposable income than most, the problem is things are going to change, and people are going to have to learn to be more careful with the money they have, and at the moment it would seem that many younger people are spending the money that there parents made and worked for. This lazy attitude is the point of my post, it seems to me that the Coal industry is happy to sell bulk coal to power stations, or for export,any should be spending more time promoting coal as a viable home heat source to get more people on side . Without the public support the writing is on the wall for coal production, I recently heard several radio reports, explaining how air quality was bad in Connecticut, due to people using wood burners in the recent power-outages. Job to see how a solar panel will keep your house warm in a snow storm.

freetown fred wrote:It was 56 ft.--3 mast w/ a lil Volvo deisel back up, my bro got the plans from a co. in China--neat part,it draw very little water & at high tide we were able to go into many places, unload the Harleys, get the Junk back out & hang out for a few days. I'll look into the pix question but I doubt it--this was back in the hard drinkin, hard ridin & basically the just back from the Nam & who gives a fk time of my life. I met some real neat people. There is a good number of Boat People out there--FULL TIME--from the IBM 100+ ft. ship for clients to lil houseboats that whole families live on all over the country. Like I said--land-lubber here

morso wrote:

freetown fred wrote:No, now you are talking about quanity purchased. I find that in anything--lets say, sheetrock. If I go to LOWES & buy, say 10 sheets, I'm going to pay the same as if I just bought one. Now, if I were to buy 100-200 sheets, and have, I've gone to the manager & gotten a break because of the quanity. It doesn't cost them anymore to have 10 or 100 sheets. It's just the way it is. A boat huh?? My 1/2 brother built a Chinese junk up in Maine many yrs ago. I helped him out & upon completion we threw the Harleys aboard & did the inter-coastal, finally ending up in Costa Rica. Pretty outstanding 2 yr venture but I found out that at heart, I'm a land-lubber & was damn glad to disembark when we got back to Fla..

How big was the Junk. that a interesting choice of boat, any pictures?

That sounds great, Some many people are so busy chasing the dollar, a bigger house, and a new car, they forget that there is a whole lot more to living, and dont bother spending a little time having some fun, I guess when you come back form a war you want to live life a little. The Usa is still the place to place to be if you want to put in the effort, you can make a great life for you self. And it dont have to be about being rich

Well said my friend.

morso wrote:

labman wrote:Well, we as Americans are lazy. We like everything easier and cleaner. We appear to have more "Disposible Income" than most, so we don't want to be bothered. I never was in that group of the "elite" where I could throw caution to the wind and just use oil or gas or electric. Wood and coal were and are the only way we can afford to heat our home. Our children EXPECT that they never lower themselves to our level and need to use coal or wood. They haven't lived through hard times! Just look at the "Occupy Wall Street" movement. A bunch of spoiled brats; Expecting everything be given to them! Doesn't it make you ill ?
So if you burn coal you wouldn't even fit into a 1% catagory; .001% maybe !

Well I think you are spot on,I think that people in the Usa do have more Disposable income than most, the problem is things are going to change, and people are going to have to learn to be more careful with the money they have, and at the moment it would seem that many younger people are spending the money that there parents made and worked for. This lazy attitude is the point of my post, it seems to me that the Coal industry is happy to sell bulk coal to power stations, or for export,any should be spending more time promoting coal as a viable home heat source to get more people on side . Without the public support the writing is on the wall for coal production, I recently heard several radio reports, explaining how air quality was bad in Connecticut, due to people using wood burners in the recent power-outages. Job to see how a solar panel will keep your house warm in a snow storm.

I have to believe that coal companies are affected by political agendas of the current administration. It's no seceret Obama would like to shut coal down! liberials tend to hide their heads to reality, or simply won't accept it. Why would you as a company want to waste funds in this political climate? You can't win an argument with stupid people (Obama); They always beat you with experence!