Surface coal mines have shut down.

[SwissMercenary]

You cannot say that. Blaming environmentalists for undermining getting alternative enrgy sources. If for you alternative is just nuclear power than you're right maybe. But the risk is just to big. And nowone would take especially the USA serious if they wanted to increase the number of nuclear powerplants.

I'm not blaming any environmentalists who have (and use) a head on their shoulders.

I am pointing the finger at the whackos, who paint a rather ugly picture to Joe Average.

The real people to blame are the big oil companies that do absolutely no effort to work on wind and solar energy. Shell here in Holland, is more or less only pumping oil, and e.g. exxonmobil (the ones who wrote Bush' point of view on Kyoto) are even worse.

Oh, but try explaining that to the masses. I mean, I can easily see the ripeness of the harvest of the lobbying efforts by the fossil fuel industry - but you can't let the aformentioned whackos go blameless.