anthracite

Coal won't peak for a while but the most desirable anthracite is already exhausted outside China and Vietnam.

The smell of wood might be nice for flavor, but that's beyond the point of anthracite being clean.

People laugh at this, but anthracite genuinely is cleaner than other coal in every regard save CO2 emissions.

For example, anthracite coal, which is the highest quality coal, produces more carbon dioxide per Btu than low-quality lignite.

Let's celebrate the new Anthropocene era by extracting some anthracene from anthracite and lighting it on fire.

For example: here in Australia, the New South Welsh are burning high grade anthracite coal in the Hunter Valley [1].

That particulate pollution from wood burning is severe compared to the smoke you'll get off anthracite, which is virtually nonexistent.

It seems everyone liked RAL 9005 ( Black ) or RAL 7016 ( Anthracite grey ).

So that's phosphate rock fertilizer, oil, various grades of coal (anthracite is basically gone already).

Apparently my colleagues all know this — everyone just knows that it's OK to burn smokeless coal (anthracite) but not wood.

Right now the best way's either to follow it on Patreon (no money needed) or to follow me on Mastodon (@anthracite@dragon.style).

If you're ever in the Scranton PA area in the summer, visit the Lackawanna Coal Mine, part of the Anthracite Heritage Museum.

“They’ll take all that red hot coals, but also they’re going to get that rich anthracite coal,” he told us.

Otherwise, wood had a lot to commend itself: it was locally available (coal comes from limited locations), doesn't involve mining dangers, and is easier to burn (some early coal proponents in the US were accused of fraud when the "rocks" they sold wouldn't burn in existing ovens -- anthracite coal is tough to ignite).

Anthracite burns very hot and produces almost pure CO2 (instead of more noxious byproducts), but few deposits are anthracite.

Anthracite is not used in the US to generate power because it is too expensive.

Anthracite burns clean enough to use in a pizza oven.