While Kansas and a dozen other states have seen plans for coal plants shelved or delayed (see Debate Over Coal Blooms in Sunflower State, below), someone wants their Liberty Fuel. The earnings out there in Corporate Land certainly show it. Peabody Energy (BTU) missed on earnings, but it grew top-line revenues by 18 percent over last year's same quarter.

In layman's terms, they are selling more coal for more money this year than last. Profits are down in the short term as the company keeps digesting expenses related to its acquisition of Australian-based Excel Coal Ltd. The stock bounced up a couple of bucks Nov. 6 on the news, and the company reaffirmed its earnings guidance for the year. It also finished its spin-off of eastern assets into their Patriot Coal Corp. (PCX) subsidiary last week. The exodus from southern West Virginia continues.

Massey Energy Co. (MEE) had another strong quarter and almost has doubled its share price since the $16 bottom of the first wave of credit-crunch trading back in August. The market seems to love the idea of Massey doing more to consolidate Central Appalachian and a new $480 million in capital spending, almost all for metallurgical coal.

Alpha Natural Resources Inc. (ANR) is taking a big bet, leaving most of its 2008 and 2009 met coal thus far unpriced, trying to squeeze every last dollar out as spot-pricing trends north.

Worldwide, demand is up. Asian coal imports are at a record high. Coal prices in Newcastle, Australia, are topping as well. There is no sign of a demand shock anywhere to the system but America. Even Europe, perpetually short of natural gas compared to North America, is taking all the imported thermal coal it can get.

The only limiting factor to all this seems to be the lack of dry bulk shipping supply, as China sucks up every empty boat to carry iron, grain or fertilizer to Asia. Bulk shipping rates have hit record highs worldwide, and stocks no one knows, such as DryShips (DRYS) and Diana Shipping Inc. (DSX), have set the world on fire.

The demand for coal seems un-levered right now to the soaring price of oil, which crossed $97 a barrel Nov. 6. It used to be that oil, coal and natural gas all moved in tandem, usually in pretty constant ratios. In terms of the sheer heat or BTUs produced, oil should only be worth six times the price of natural gas (barrels to MCFs). Right now it's roughly 12 times, $97 to $8. Nothing really makes sense.

Diesel prices are soaring, as that product is being sacrificed to produce more home-heating oil for folks in the American northeast. Home-heating oil is at a record high, near $2.50 a gallon wholesale.

After a respite, gasoline is back over $3 a gallon, mostly due to refineries running below capacity. With oil over $90, refineries have been reticent to buy much and make extra gas with their profit margins squeezed. High oil prices are good for drillers, but bad for refiners and integrated oil companies like ExxonMobile (XOM) or ConocoPhillips (COP).

The American dollar is weaker, demand for all sorts of energy is at all time highs, and so are prices. They should be staying there for a while. China has no plans of closing for repairs anytime soon.

It's been one thing to have supply shocks, like in the 1970s when the OPEC guys just took a couple of weeks off. It's another thing for an extra billion or two billion folks to show up wanting to drive cars or make electricity to play their Nintendo Wii. If the entire populations of China and India used as much oil per person as do Americans, world supply would need to triple. That simply can't happen.

The only price that isn't up? The price of uranium for nuclear plant fuel. Spot sits around $80 after topping $120 per pound earlier in 2007. The Year Zero crowd seems split on whether nuclear power is better or worse than coal. Electricity producer NRG Energy Inc. recently got permits to build the first new nuclear plant in the U.S. Slated for South Texas The 2,700-megawatt facility would be the first new reactor of its type in more than 30 years.

Nuclear power could be critical, not just for making more needed electricity but for specialized industrial use. It would be a unique way to help unlock the processing of the Canadian oil sands or oil shale in the American Rockies, both of which require massive quantities of heat and steam to unlock their greasy goodness.

Yes, the price of energy is so high, people are talking about oil shale again. Feels like 1978, but without the hang-glider lapels.

Rob Cornelius watches energy, utility and metals markets for The State Journal. He's a former reporter for WTAP-TV, The Parkersburg News and Ohio University Public Radio. Reach him at robcwv@gmail.com.

Debate Over Coal Blooms in Sunflower State

The movement against coal-fired power generation got a boost last month. An appointed Kansas regulatory official ruled to stop Sunflower Electric Power Corp. from building new electric generating plants that would burn coal.

The grounds? That carbon dioxide emissions from the plants would exacerbate global warming, threaten human health and the state's environment.

The ruling was a first. When Rod Bremby, secretary of Health and Environment for the state, told Sunflower no, it was the first time that coal-fired facilities had been denied on health grounds. Kansas has no laws on the books regulating CO2 emissions. Bremby cited an April Supreme Court ruling that broadly labeled CO2 a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. Carbon dioxide is currently not a federally regulated substance.

This new weapon is sure to be seen a precedent by environmental forces, which are fighting the construction of new coal-fired plants nationwide.

Of course, Bremby's decision is just the beginning. And that's when things get interesting. Local media in Kansas reported that the appointed secretary went against the recommendations of his staff; now he and the governor who appointed him, Kathleen Sebelius, are on the receiving end of a corporate campaign to flip the decision or go around the authority of both.

Kansans saw on Nov. 5 statewide full-page newspaper ads from Kansans For Affordable Energy. In them? Smiling pictures of such luminaries as Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, with the text, "Why are these men smiling? .... Because the recent decision by the Sebelius administration means Kansas will import more natural gas from countries like Russia, Venezuela and Iran."

The ads are backed by corporate interests, including Sunflower and Peabody Energy, according to the Lawrence Journal World.

The governor told that newspaper the ads were "over-the-top nonsense" and that "the ad is offensive to every Kansan, and the people of Kansas deserve an apology."

Of course, careful readers will realize that natural gas from the Middle East probably never has been burned in Kansas and probably never will, owing to the fact that cheaper domestic gas exists in nearby states like Oklahoma. And Chesapeake Energy Corp. got into the act on the airwaves there shortly after the Bremby decision. That's right. More ads criticizing coal as unhealthy and harmful to the environment.

This is all a dress rehearsal for a bigger national public relations battle if this Kansas decision gets traction. The war probably will not be won or lost here for or against coal. Sunflower expects to go to court to strike down the decision and should have good odds of doing so based on the lack of state or federal law regarding CO2 as a health risk.

Sunflower argued that the order did not show evidence "that emissions of carbon dioxide from the proposed power plants will cause a substantial endangerment to the health of persons or to the environment."

You also can expect some talk of the equal-protection clause, as Bremby's ruling has not been applied to shut down existing coal plants in the state.

He will appear soon before a legislative panel of six coal plant supporters to explain himself.

-- Rob Cornelius