Via Andy Revkin, we learn about the opening of China’s first coal-to-liquids plant. This is an important development, because of the very real possibility that relatively abundant coal could become a substitute for dwindling petroleum supplies – a happy prospect for cheap global energy, not so much for the climate. Choose the economic and environmental path you prefer.

According to BP, China has the third-largest coal reserves in the world, behind the U.S. and Russia.