Get Cleaner Coal With This One Weird Trick: Sunlight On Photovoltaic Panels

There are some fantasies we all can't let go of, like unicorns, being real-life friends with Luke Skywalker, and 1970s era Farrah Fawcett being our girlfriend. All equally unrealistic and downright imaginary things. If you're a climate change denying goober like this guy, you've been fapping to your biggest fantasy - clean coal - for YEARS now. But now that impossible dream, that Gatsby-esque green light, is within their grasp, though probably not the way they had hoped. Retrograde conservatives, we are now on our way to (kinda) clean coal. Yes, clean coal at last, thanks to that most hippie energy source ever, the sun:

The largest coal company in the world, Coal India, is aiming to cut its own utility bills by installing solar photovoltaic panels at its facilities across the country. The coal giant is seeking proposals from solar energy companies to build a modular 2 megawatt solar plant on 9 acres of its own land. This plant could be scaled to export power to the grid.

Not only is Coal India pursuing commercial solar power plants, it’s also “mulling” the installation of rooftop solar panels at the Ranchi Central Mine Planning and Design Institute, where it does mining research. The panels would go on “staff colonies” and in mining areas, with the goal of reducing the company’s energy bills.

Coal India explained the reason for these moves in its bid document:

“India has an abundance of sunshine and the trend of depletion of fossil fuels is compelling energy planners to examine the feasibility of using renewable sources of energy like solar, wind, and so on.”

That is a really long block quote and we are sorry but it is SO AWESOME YOU GUYS. The coal company will cut its costs with sweet sweet sunlight because it knows full well that we are running out of coal. Digging up horrible lung-killing coal will actually be fueled (PUN TOTALLY INTENDED) by solar power. This would only amuse us more if somehow Coal India could hire Solyndra to manufacture and install the solar panels. We don't know about you, but we'll be fapping forevermore to the thought of climate change deniers' heads exploding, Scanners -style, as they try to figure out how they can still love coal when they hate the thought of solar power SO MUCH.  Our pleasure will reach its apex, so to speak, when we think about how sad they will be to contemplate that one of God's greatest treasures -- an enormous coal company -- believes that coal is a finite resource that will go away and therefore we might need stupid granola-head power from sources like solar and wind. And what about the poor Dominionists, who have to be gnashing their teeth at this probably-pagan company acting as if we might run out of Creation Carbon before the Bossman in the Sky gets back? We'll be busy with this the rest of the afternoon, thanks.

[ Think Progress ]