Yes, everyone needs to stop burning coal. You wrote "given that we already have energy sources that are not only significantly cheaper, but are also compatible with more productive uses of land.

This needs to be clarified. We don't have enough installed capacity of the cheaper and cleaner energy sources to replace the current demand. We need to reduce demand and increase clean energy capacity. We will stop burning coal when we don't need it. If you stopped burning coal today many people would be without electricity and many factories would need to shut.

If you want to stop burning coal then write about increasing green energy capacity and demand that we reduce our use of electricity.

I don't understand the more productive uses of land part at all. Are you talking about the mines or the powerplants. I don't mind turning them both into forests or grass land. Not all that productive but certainly less destructive. That is what should be done and is often done in the U.S. as a matter of course for open pit coal mines. Underground mines you can push the tailings back into the mine, collapse the entrance and remove the external structures. Power plants are a much bigger problem for repurposing. Waste ponds, ash piles, tons of equipment and large structures.

Almost all powerplants are in one way or another the responsibility of the rate payers. Because almost all industrial scale electricity production is either done by the government or a public utility the cost of doing what needs to be done will be at the consumer's expense. I am ready to pay my share.

TEK