Twice as many.
In 2016, more than 130,000 people
worked as solar installers in the US,
while 51,000 worked in coal mining.
So, what happened?
First, solar panels got a lot cheaper.
Ten years ago, rooftop solar systems were more than
twice as expensive as they are today.
The price drop in the earlier years was driven
by a huge manufacturing surplus,
mostly from China.
Later, around 2013, the price
continued to drop, but more slowly.
These reductions were driven by other
factors,
like more efficient panels,
and by the fact that adoption of solar power
spread by word of mouth.
You can see it in this map from SolarCity,
the United States’ largest solar installer.
It shows residential solar panels
in the Fort Collins, Colorado area.
Each dot represents a customer:
the yellow dots are ordinary customers,
and the green dots are customers referred by friends.
Let’s watch that again.
Look at this area just north of the city proper.
The yellow dots are kind of all over the place,
but the green dots start in one area
then radiate outwards.
Cheaper more efficient panels,
this contagion effect,
plus tax credits and financing options
that make it possible to buy panels
without paying a lot upfront,
are all these factors that have led to
a massive increase in solar installations.
On average, a new rooftop solar system
is installed in the US every four minutes.
And all of those installations
require a lot of workers.
Which is why the number of solar employees
has more than tripled since 2010.
Meanwhile, the number of coal jobs
in the US has fallen sharply.
But if you look at the data, you can see that
this trend has been in the works for decades.
At its peak in the mid 1920s,
the coal mining industry employed
about 900,000 people.
But that number has been falling ever since.
The Great Depression, decreased demand,
and technological innovations drove the first
wave of job losses.
More recently, the numbers dropped thanks to
a major competitor to coal:
“Energy companies are increasingly
scouring the country for natural gas...”
"Hydraulic fracturing is behind
the coast-to-coast energy boom."
“...cracking the shale rock thousands
of feet beneath the ground,
and freeing the precious fossil fuels inside.”
"Fracking is a remarkable innovation."
The electricity that charges your phone and
powers your refrigerator gets there through
wires that are controlled by an electric utility company.
These companies build and manage the power plants
that turn fuel like coal and natural gas into electricity.
But not all fuel is created equal.
Because advancements in fracking technology
have made natural gas cheap and accessible
utility companies are buying way more of it —
and way less coal.
In 2005, coal-fired power plants produced
about half the nation’s electricity.
By 2016, that share had fallen to about 30 percent.
Natural gas has another big advantage over coal:
it gives off significantly less carbon dioxide
when it’s burned for electricity.
Power plants are responsible for
about a quarter of carbon dioxide emissions,
and that’s why the EPA under President Obama
issued 10 different regulations targeting
coal-fired power plants, which critics often blame
for the coal industry’s decline.
"President Obama has hurt the heart and soul
of my state, our proud coal miners and the
communities where they live."
"An onslaught of over-regulations,
federal regulations,
have made it harder to mine coal
and harder to burn coal."
"We're going to save the coal industry,
we're gonna save that coal industry,
believe me, we're gonna save it.
But the truth is, a lot of this
might be out of President Trump’s hands.
A group of researchers from Columbia University
studied the factors that led to the 27 percent
drop in coal production between 2011 and 2016.
And they found that Obama’s new regulations
were responsible for about three to five percent
of that decline.
Natural gas, decreased demand, and renewables
like wind and solar played a much bigger part.
The coal industry’s troubles started way
before Obama, but his regulations continue
to be the focus of Trump’s rescue plan.
"The war on coal is over."
"We will put our miners back to work."
Unless the president starts to acknowledge
some more important factors behind coal’s decline,
there’s not much he can do to bring back those jobs.
