Minnesota should be using wind energy based on our potential for wind driven energy. Instead we are a state that gets 62% of our energy from coal, when we should use NO coal. That should set off alarm bells of corruption. It should cause major alarms any time any politician in Minnesota finds coal in any way acceptable.

• The combined direct and indirect contributions of the coal industry to Minnesota's economy are more than $2 billion.
• Using more than 19 million tons, Minnesota ranks 20th in coal use.
• About 62% of the electricity used in Minnesota is produced by coal.
• Minnesota does not produce coal.
• Minnesota has 13 coal-fired power plants.

(American Coal Foundation)

Using coal threatens the health of everyone in Minnesota. One politician said, "You can fish anywhere in Minnesota, and you cannot safely eat the fish because of mercury". Most of the mercury comes from our coal fired plants.

The largest source of mercury pollution is coal-fired power plants. Airborne mercury emitted by these facilities is deposited anywhere from within a few hundred kilometers of the smokestacks to across continents, far from its source. Biological processes change much of the deposited mercury into methylmercury, a potent neurotoxin that humans and other organisms readily absorb. Methylmercury easily travels up the aquatic food chain, accumulating at higher concentrations at each level. Larger predator species contain the most mercury, which is then passed on to those who eat them.
(American Coal Foundation)

Mercury is just some of the bad effects of coal burning.

There are a number of adverse environmental effects of coal mining and burning.

These effects include:

• release of carbon dioxide and methane, both of which are greenhouse gases causing climate change and global warming according to the IPCC
• waste products including Uranium, Thorium, and other heavy metals
• acid rain
• interference with groundwater and water table levels
• impact of water use on flows of rivers and consequential impact on other land-uses
• dust nuisance
• subsidence above tunnels, sometimes damaging infrastructure
• rendering land unfit for the other uses.
  (Wiki)

Well, if you question the effects of using coal, a picture of coal mountaintop strip mining is worth a thousand words!

(ThinkProgress)

Wait, wait, the most important point is that everyone is expecting some sort of carbon tax to happen and therefore it will also make coal the most of expensive of options soon!

The testimony was submitted by expert witnesses from Synapse Energy Economics on behalf of UCS, Fresh Energy, Izaak Walton League of America—Midwest Office, Wind on the Wires, and the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy. It follows on a related report recently released by UCS that explains why future climate laws are likely to be adopted in the next few years and quantifies the financial implications for coal plants. The report finds that the relative cost impact of expected regulations on global warming emissions on new coal plants ranges from 17-62% percent.
(Union of Concerned Scientists)

With this type of evidence, a coal plant idea should be dead on arrival. Yet wait we the lipstick-on-a-pig idea of

Worthington, Minn. — A farm field near the small town of Heron Lake is the planned location for Minnesota's first coal-fired ethanol plant. If it receives all the necessary permits, it would be the first major coal project in the state in nearly 10 years.
(MPR)

Wait, wait, there is more, from our own Minnesota Brown:

I've always been confident that Excelsior's boondoggle Mesaba Energy Project (a proposed Iron Range coal gas plant that purportedly runs on apple pie fumes and the American Dream) will never receive permits. Why? The federal haze standard. You can't build too many big industrial things near national parks because they reduce visibility and air quality in the parks. We've got all sorts of mines and stuff here and have been hovering just below the point where visibility is compromised in the Boundary Waters or at Voyageurs National Park. There is enough room under the haze standard to build the steel plant and other project, but not for this crazy power plant. It's all an exercise in futility.

Well, then I see this from the Washington Post today. The Bushies are trying to dump the haze standard!
(Minnesota Brown)

Specifically, Minnesota Brown is referring to the Bush administration making the hase requirement so minimal as to be totally ineffective:

The Bush administration is on the verge of implementing new air quality rules that will make it easier to build power plants near national parks and wilderness areas, according to rank-and-file agency scientists and park managers who oppose the plan.
(Washington Post)

We can fight back, the coal lobby is strong, yet it is so obviously bad that the light of truth hurts. Obviously, never support Republicans who are all loyally pro-coal mining and pro-coal plants. However, support Democrats who are brave enough to stand up to coal, who don't use phrases like "all alternates should be considered" and who don't list coal as a "consideration". Lets face it, if a Democrat is already backpedaling on coal, that Democrat is already on the wrong path.

This year we have a clear choice in the US Senate race as well as other races. Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer is opposed to coal and Al Franken has listed coal as an option. So, are you as a voter going to stand up and vote responsibly or are you going to make more excuses and let Franken and the coal lobby win?