US sees gloomy outlook for coal

by George Hohmann

West Virginia native Ray Lane, the managing partner of a major Silicon Valley venture capital firm, has dire words for the coal industry.
"I see the coal industry trying to support the past," he told a large crowd at the Charleston Area Alliance's Annual Celebration at the Clay Centre.

Lane was president and chief operating officer of Oracle Corp., the world's second-largest software company, in the late 1990s. Now, as a managing partner of the venture capital firm of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, "I want to solve the energy crisis," he said.
Kleiner Perkins is famous for being an early backer of several companies, including Google and Netscape, which became big Internet successes. In recent years, Kleiner Perkins has invested in companies that seek environmentally friendly solutions to energy problems.

Lane said entrepreneurs focused on wind, solar and geothermal power -- not oil and coal -- will create the jobs of the future.
"Tell your kids, 'The wind will be at your back for the next 30 years,'" if they get into renewable energy, personalized medicine or digital mobility, he said.
Lane said the United States' energy strategy for the last 50 years can be summarized as: "Borrow, buy, burn." The US has 5 % of the world's population but uses 25 % of the world's energy.
"We're energy pigs," he said. Studies show that 55 % of the energy generated in the US is lost as waste heat.

Americans who insist on driving around encased in 4,000 pounds of metal are going to start paying for it, he said. Europeans are already paying the equivalent of $ 9 a gallon for gasoline.
Lane, a graduate of West Virginia University, watches coal closely. "I want to see the coal industry innovate," he said. To that end, one of Kleiner Perkins' investments is in a start-up named GreatPoint Energy. Other investors include The Dow Chemical and Peabody Energy. GreatPoint uses technology originally patented by Exxon to convert coal, petroleum coke and biomass into pipeline-quality natural gas while allowing for the capture and sequestration of carbon dioxide.

Even though the United States still has a lot of coal, "I don't think you're going to see any new coal plants like the 600 we have in the US," Lane said. "We're talking about putting a tax on carbon. It will probably result in a 35 % to 50 % increase in electricity bills."
Lane said today's solar cells are only 20 to 26 % efficient and generate electricity that costs about 25 cents per kWh. Solar technology is rapidly evolving. Meanwhile, electricity generated with coal costs about 6 cents per kWh.
Clean coal -- "whatever that is" -- will probably cost 11 cents to 15 cents per kWh, "if we're lucky," Lane said. "Solar will attack that price within two years."