Know Your Power (KYP) is a coalition formed to educate citizens – on a state-by-state basis – about power generation plants in their states and especially about newly proposed coal-burning plants. KYP seeks to identify and recruit like-minded organizations and individuals to join this campaign, including the health community (especially physicians specializing in pulmonary health and cardiovascular health), the American Lung Association and similar organizations focused on improving public health, community leaders, public officials, students and others.

Chesapeake Energy Corporation is the founding sponsor and to date has been the primary source of funding for KYP chapters nationwide. Why are we involved?

For starters, we believe coal is simply on the wrong side of history – it is a 19th or 20th century solution to a 21st century challenge. With as many as 150 new coal plants currently proposed, we believe we have not seen enough discussion yet about the harm coal pollution causes to public health and the environment.  We also have not seen enough focus on natural gas and other clean energy solutions, such as wind or solar power, as the answer to America’s need for more power but with less pollution.

In addition, we believe the reason these coal plants have been proposed in the first place is because of two common misconceptions: first, that natural gas is no longer an abundant enough fuel to power new natural gas power plants; and second, that coal is a cheap source of future power. In fact, natural gas reserves are at a 30-year high and growing while coal has been a cheap fuel in the past only because all of the external costs of burning coal (worse air pollution, greater greenhouse gas emissions, lower public health, etc.) have not yet been internalized. In all likelihood, such external costs will become paid in the future through a carbon tax or perhaps through forced carbon sequestration requirements. Once such external costs have been properly internalized, new coal plants will not likely be able to compete against cleaner sources of future power generation, such as natural gas and wind and solar power.

We do not hesitate – as a leading producer of clean, abundant, affordable American natural gas – to promote it as an attractive alternative to coal. Coal pollution negatively impacts any state or region while natural gas is a superior fuel that will deliver clean power for generations.