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news continued existing coal ash landfill, the company determined that on-site options will meet Cane Run's storage needs until the new gas plant is placed in operation. Withdrawing the landfill permit amounts to a savings of $54 million, which was the estimated total capital cost of the proposed four-phase landfill expansion. Cane Run began operating in 1954, and by 1969 had a total of six coal units in operation. Units 1, 2 and 3 were retired in 1987. LG&E; helped develop and install one of the nation's first scrubbers to reduce sulfur-dioxide emissions from coal in 1973. At Mill Creek, 20 miles southwest of downtown Louisville, LG&E; in late October asked the PSC for authority to spend $132 million to install a new scrubber on unit 3. The company said a new scrubber would save customers about $30 million since it would cost an esti- mated $162 million to retrofit the existing scrubber. The company asked PSC for a final order by January 18, 2013. If the project is approved by regulators, LG&E; spokeswoman Chris Whelan said scrubber installation should be completed by April 2016. Apres le Deluge Democratique D A T EL I N E WA SH I N G T ON BY LUKE POPOVICH For election-day losers as much as for the winners, keeping perspective should be the first order of busi- ness. Now for some perspective. After the political flood, and all was said and done—and spent—it's pretty much the status quo all over again. No grand political re-alignment here. Voters doubled down on the president. He returns to face a divided Congress, with a Senate more firmly in control of his party but a GOP House determined to oppose his regulatory agenda. True, senate Democrats dashed GOP hopes by holding serve and more, adding two seats. But House Republicans emerged in charge, as they have for eight of the past 10 elections, prompting Speaker John Boehner of Ohio to lay claim to "the peoples" support. The same nation that voted for an anti-coal president voted for an anti-EPA House of Representatives. Gubernatorial races played out largely as expected. "Nothing in the results can be interpreted as a mandate for either the president or House Republicans," said NMA CEO Hal Quinn. As the French say, "the more things change, the more they stay the same." Still, "the same" is not good for coal mining. Clearly an effective NMA-led ground game—spearheaded by Mine The Vote, by Count On Coal, by FACES—could not overcome a shrink- ing GOP base and unappealing candidates in key senate races. Our powerful door-to-door ground game, supported by press relations, advertising and social media, got the coal message in the campaigns and the coal vote out in scores of coal-heavy counties. Political guru Stuart Rothenberg even told PBS's election night audience that the pro-coal message had come through loud and clear in a half-dozen swing states. But it wasn't enough to turn a tide. Swelling numbers of urban and Hispanic voters, as well as majorities of women, unionized labor and non- whites broke strongly for the president and Democrats. It was the tide that lifted the president to victory in a half dozen toss up states, including Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Wisconsin where mining has a strong presence. " Obama is the first president to win with a jobless rate above 7.2% and the first after F.D.R. to win a second term with a smaller popular vote than he won in his first term. He also won with a "favorability" rating below 50%—usually a sign of trouble—and an even smaller percentage of white voters than he got in 2008. He didn't need them. We'll leave for others to pass on the wisdom of nominating a financial industry white male in the midst of an economic hangover and the fatal selection of outspoken cultural conservatives to oppose vulnerable Democrats in senate races in two big coal states, Missouri and Indiana. As Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld put it, "you go to war with what you have." Still, exit polls at voting booths were telling. They showed Gov. Romney faced stiffer head winds than the president faced. A slight major- ity held an unfavorable view of the GOP standard bearer, seeing him as insensitive to the economic insecurities that dominated this election. More voters blamed President George Bush than blamed President Obama for the poor state of the economy. And a majority favored liberal immigration reform that Romney's party opposed. This was a stinging lia- bility for the GOP side, as the president won almost three-fourths of a ris- ing number of Hispanic voters. In other words, coal lost in this election but not because of coal min- ers, coal companies or coal energy. Democrats at the top of the tickets did not win by flaunting the messages of our critics. If climate change and carbon taxes, clean energy standards and coal-killing regulations were thought to be winners, we would have heard them on the campaign trail. We didn't. Even after Hurricane Sandy and promptings from New York City Mayor Bloomberg, the president declined the invitation from greens to call for greenhouse gas controls. Renewable energy advocates may think their subsidies are safer today. We'll see. Michigan voters soundly defeated a tougher renewable energy standard that attracted nationwide environmental support and fiscal con- servatives will have the knives drawn as Congress looks at spending. "We have been heard," said Alpha Natural Resources CEO Kevin Crutchfield. "And we will be heard again in the years ahead." Popovich is a spokesperson for the National Mining Association, the industry's trade group based in Washington, D.C. Nothing in the results can be interpreted as a mandate for either the president or House Republicans.—NMA CEO Hal Quinn 14 www.coalage.com November 2012 "