"CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Air pollution from coal-fired power plants costs the U.S. more in health damage than those plants contribute to the American economy, according to a new study in a respected economics journal."

"Coal plants produce the largest 'gross external damages' -- $53 billion annually -- of any of the industries examined in the new study published in the latest issue of The American Economic Review.

'What we're saying isn't that we need to shut down all of the power plants,' said Robert Mendelsohn, an economist at the Yale University School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. 'We're actually recommending that they do more abatement of the pollution from the plants. That will lower the damages that these plants cause.'

Mendelsohn co-authored the study with economists Nicholas Muller of Middlebury College and William Nordhaus of Yale."

Ken Ward Jr. reports for the Charleston Gazette October 5, 2011. [2]