Jeff, if you are smart enough to understand coal is dirty, you also understand about external costs not paid by the coal industry for the combustion of its dirty product- such as people dying from cancer due to their exposure from the pollution.  Or people made sick by their exposure to mercury from fish.  Building the transmission lines is not such an expensive propositon by comparison- and much of the transmission lines were built from Healy to Fairbanks anyway.

The fact is the Interior has five dirty coal plants in operation.  Even worse the University is building another dirty coal plant.  One of the regents works for Usibelli.

Killing this project throws the Interior under the bus.  Too bad no one cares enough about the Interior to fight for it.  The air pollution up in Fairbanks is now the worst in the United States.  Why?  No one cares that it is killing people, (strokes, heart attacks and cancer) and making people sick.