Great post Shaun

There is much talk about "clean coal technology" that may come on stream in the next ten years or so. This will not be without cost and I suspect that a greater amount of coal will be needed to compensate for the energy input into whatever that technology is.

Does this report take this into account, or is it based on existing usage methods? If not and 120% (say) of current requirements are needed to clean up coal usage, then peak will occur 5-10 years earlier.

The Energy Watch Group report is discussing coal production only, not the uses it will be put to. As you say 'clean coal' has a substantial energy cost, which will only exacerbate any production limitations.

I'm actually preparing a report on 'clean coal' and Coal-to-Liquids technology that should be up on the soon-to-be-relaunched Lean Economy Connection website soon.