The coal industry needs to use environmental groups' own tactics against them in order to defeat their organizational powers, according to a social media review by the American Coal Council.
"The data unquestionably points to one conclusion, that we the pro-coal community are outgunned and outmanned on the cyber battlefield," said Joshua Hayman, senior fuels contract analyst at Xcel Energy Inc.
According to a Dec. 11 webcast by the American Coal Council on enhancing coal's social media effectiveness, the presenters recommended the coal industry use some of the tactics suggested by Saul Alinsky, an American community organizer who worked to improve the conditions of the poor and wrote the book Rules for Radicals, often used by various environmental groups as a strategy guide.
"The anti-coal groups have used the ideology and Rules for Radicals very well for their narrative of coal being dirty and horrifically bad for the environment as well as people's health — especially children," said April Zoebisch, senior fuels analyst for Georgia Power Co., a subsidiary of Southern Co. "Pro-coal groups can follow the same approach, utilizing the same tactics in Rules for Radicals to take that power away."
Tom Clark, a commercial analyst for Seminole Electric Cooperative Inc., said the industry has "been the 'haves' for a long time — King Coal," while the "have nots" were the poor who needed help. The changing market, though, is turning the tide on this dynamic.
"It might be a time that the coal industry needs to look further and maybe use some of these tactics, because we are not the 'haves' as much anymore, and start fighting back," he said.
An American Coal Council leadership council conducted a review of social media strategies and engagement by the coal industry as compared to other groups. Discussing the panel's findings, Amanda Torgerson, a fuel buyer for American Electric Power Co. Inc., said on the webcast that the greens have a much bigger presence on social media.
Particularly among millennials, social media messaging is critical, Torgerson said.
"If you are looking to reach this group, you must have a strong online and mobile presence," she said.
Hayman recommended several steps to fight against the dominance of the anti-coal movement on social media, including expanding the pro-coal message beyond Facebook to other social media sites such as Twitter and Instagram.
This will entail a coordinated effort from the coal community, with participation from electric utilities, coal producers, heavy equipment sales and repair vendors, and the environmental service sectors involved in restoration.
"The messaging must also be delivered in a way that is engaging, interactive, user-friendly, factual and even humorous and fun to appeal to a variety of social media followers," he said.
He added that the pro-coal community can adopt the Alinsky tactics, "but only if they don't compromise our integrity or credibility."
Most importantly, he said, the benefits of low-cost energy, centuries of capacities and energy independence must be constantly mentioned.
Melinda Pierce, legislative director for the Sierra Club, told S&P Global Market Intelligence that the coal company should save its money, as "any social media effort or fake campaign to push this deadly product is going to be seen for exactly what it is: self-serving propaganda."
"There's a big difference between the grassroots efforts of millions of Americans demanding that corporate polluters clean up their act and astroturf campaigns backed by the millionaires creating these problems in the first place," she said.
Emily Medine, a principal at Energy Ventures Analysis, told S&P Global Market Intelligence that the most important thing for the coal industry is a unified voice. In the past, she said, coal producers were more focused on competing with each other and they have only recently learned to work together as a group.
"Obviously everybody's still competing, but it's a different dynamic because the issue is surviving as an industry," she said.
Some of the ways the coal industry can work together is to unify pro-coal messages such as the need for moderating tax credits for renewable credits such as wind power to allow for a more level playing field.
Others in the coal industry have said as far back as September 2016 that coal needs to get more involved in social media to fight environmentalists on their own turf. Former Ohio Coal Association President Christian Palich urged the coal industry to use social media platforms to attack green groups on the sources of their funding and the impact their war on coal has on communities.
Another public affairs specialist at the time said the clean coal message is a "spin that just isn't going to work."
