Strangely, the topic sentence for the article appears at the end of the seventh paragraph. :P "Despite its rapid decline, coal still generates about 20 percent of the nation’s electricity and has strong political backing in pockets of the country."
"[state's attorney Ladd] Erickson described Coal Creek Station as a “critical piece of national security infrastructure,” because it provides reliable power at a time of growing strain on the electricity grid.
Erickson also described himself as a “big believer” in climate change and said these anti-renewable ordinances would be temporary. He added that he has been meeting regularly with wind-power developers and working on revised rules so they can operate in this part of North Dakota once the power plant’s sale is final. But the prospect that wind energy would replace the area’s lignite industry wasn’t acceptable, he said.
“If the wind turbines were the one to replace the plant, that wasn’t something we wanted,” he said. “Our miners are very important.”
