Montana’s energy future is now black as coal

Montana’s energy future is now black as coal

Coal dust trails behind a large mine dump truck near Colstrip, Montana (Photo by Darrell Ehrlick of the Daily Montanan).Longtime Montanans will recall that more than half-a-century ago the now-defunct Montana Power Company declared the Big Sky State would become “the boiler room for the nation” — fueled by the shoveling the massive coal deposits of the Powder and Tongue River basins into the furnaces of the first two Colstrip generation units.  …