Associated Press: The future of coal is getting darker.
Economic forces, pollution concerns and competition from cleaner fuels are slowly nudging nations around the globe away from the fuel that made the industrial revolution possible.
The U.S. will burn 943 million tons of coal this year, only about as much as it did in 1993. Now its on the verge of adopting pollution rules that may all but prohibit the construction of new coal plants. And China, which burns 4 billion tons of coal a year -- as much as the...