[rad-green] U.S. energy secretary hopes Mexico, Canada will help export American coal

*https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-coal-usmca/us-energy-secretary-hopes-mexico-canada-will-help-export-american-coal-idUSKBN2012OY
<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-coal-usmca/us-energy-secretary-hopes-mexico-canada-will-help-export-american-coal-idUSKBN2012OY>REUTERS
        FEBRUARY 7, 2020*





*U.S. energy secretary hopes Mexico, Canada will help export American
coalBy Timothy GardnerWASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Energy Secretary Dan
Brouillette said on Friday that Canada and Mexico could help export U.S.
coal to Asia to get around the blocking of shipments by West Coast states
concerned about the impact of the fuel on climate change.*

[image: image.png]
*FILE PHOTO: U.S. Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette speaks with
journalists during a roundtable in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil February 2, 2020.
REUTERS/Pilar Olivares/File Photo*

Brouillette said he expects the two U.S. neighbors will offer opportunities
to export coal in talks that could be facilitated by the new North American
trade agreement, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, that
President Donald Trump signed last month.

“That’s why the USMCA was so important,” Brouillette said at an Atlantic
Council event in Washington. “We hope to work more collaboratively with
both Mexico and Canada to find export facilities to get the coal from
Wyoming,” and other states in the U.S. West to Asia and other global
markets.

Wyoming is a top U.S. coal producing state, but its exports have been
hampered.

The states of California, Washington and Oregon have blocked permits for
coal ports on concerns about coal’s impact on climate change. Some U.S.
lawmakers have complained about a lack of environmental standards in the
USMCA.

“Nonetheless it’s not going to prevent the administration from working with
our colleagues in Canada and Mexico to look for those types of
opportunities,” Brouillette said.

He said he met with Jason Kenney, the conservative premier of the Western
Canadian province of Alberta, on Thursday. “We had a very wide ranging and
extensive conversation about that very topic. I think there is a lot of
interest in doing this on the part of the Canadians,” he said.

The West Coast Canadian province of British Columbia already exports some
U.S. coal. If there was an agreement between Washington and Ottawa to boost
shipments, the coal would likely be sent through Alberta to a port in
British Columbia.

Kenney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about
the talks. The office of Mexico’s Energy Secretary Rocio Nahle did not
immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump’s administration has been trying to help coal mining companies which
are suffering amid a glut of cheap natural gas. U.S. coal-fired electricity
output last year fell to the lowest level since 1975.

Brouillette said the Energy Department will direct up to $64 million in
funding for research and development into more efficient coal plants.
Brouillette also said some types of coal could be processed to remove
minerals for electric batteries that are in demand for electric vehicles
and storing renewable power.

*Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Additional reporting by Marianna Parraga in
Mexico City and Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba; Editing by Paul Simao and
Daniel Wallis*

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