Albo’s idiots set course for coal

Thursday 17 September 2026

Yesterday, LVO argued that coal use is still rising using this chart.

I will make the basic point that LVO overlooked: in economics, the rate of change matters more than the absolute amount. In those terms, coal use is clearly slowing fast, notwithstanding the recent surge in AI-related demand and post-COVID shocks

The IEA put out its mid-year coal outlook a few days ago and shows a similar plateau.

The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers

$1 for your first month, then:

$24.99 / month

$249 / year

Cancel at any time through our billing provider, Stripe

About the author

David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.