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The Illinois Clean Energy Jobs Act is shrewd economic policy-making, setting up the state to gain from a growing industry that will bring new employment and expand local tax bases.

Community activists, tribal lawmakers and a congressman are pushing to reinvest in regional initiatives after the retirement of Navajo Generating Station, once the biggest coal plant west of the Mississippi.

Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have published a report showing how the demise of coal is accelerating. “We’re in the middle of an energy transition,” one of the authors said.

“Solar and wind power are growing so rapidly that for the first time ever, the United States will likely get more power in 2021 from renewable energy than from coal.”

In news that “is promising for coal miners, retirees and their widows,” an Appalachian group of senators is pushing for a December vote to preserve benefits for 90,000 mining families.

Researchers in Australia argue that the greatest economic hope for distressed coalfield communities may very well lie in a repurposing of infrastructure for a buildout of a utility-scale renewables industry.

The Canadian province serves as “a real-world example for what has been a largely theoretical discussion about how best to transition to a low-carbon economy without sacrificing workers and communities.”

“There is understandably angst in our coal communities,” said a representative for PacifiCorp, which is putting $3 billion into windfarms. “But I think there is also a new chapter coming.”

With the recent closures of Navajo Generating Station in Arizona and Bruce Mansfield Station in Pennsylvania, coal-fired power continues to lose the race against more modern forms of generation.

“While Appalachia has cheap shale gas driving big new investments, the Great Plains has an unlimited supply of even cleaner cheap wind” bringing “new potential for economic expansion in the Heartland.”