Al Gore: Cheap Coal is a Lie

This is from Al Gore and David Blood (it is relatively long, so you may want to "read the whole thing"). Comments?:

Cheap coal is a lie – stand up to the industry’s cynical fightback: It is becoming increasingly difficult to avoid the reality that the days of coal ... are numbered. In a world where carbon emissions will increasingly have to be constrained, coal, as the dirtiest of the fossil fuels, is the energy asset most vulnerable ... to seeing its market value collapse well ahead of its previously anticipated useful life. ...

But as the coal industry fights for survival, it has ... embarked on a global campaign to promote coal as the solution to energy poverty. This disingenuous claim is predicated on the notion that coal is the cheapest way of providing electricity to the one-fifth of the world’s population lacking access to an electricity grid.

This ... is extremely misleading. If ever implemented, it would actually significantly worsen the condition of the 1.3 billion people mired in energy poverty.

Most developing countries face serious challenges that are already being exacerbated by climate change-related extreme weather events. They are being battered by stronger storms, more destructive floods, deeper and longer droughts and disruptive switches in the seasonal timing of rain. ... Food security and water supplies are being compromised, natural resources stressed, and critical infrastructure crippled.

Access to affordable and reliable energy is, of course, essential for sustainable development, poverty reduction, improved access to education and healthcare, and the promotion of public safety and stable government. We should not waver in our commitment to remedy energy poverty...

But the relative merits of different energy options must be considered over the long term with an emphasis on three factors: financial cost, reliability, and impact on society and the environment. And when viewed through this lens, renewable energy – particularly solar photovoltaic energy, or PV – far outranks coal as the best future energy choice for developing nations. ...