I am ignoring the climate change issues for this post.

For a 1000 year resource where use is growing at 7% per annum the resource is exhausted after about 65 years.

You can prove this yourself with an Excel spreadsheet if you know compounding interest formulae.

In simple terms usage rate doubles every 10 years at 7%. So even ignoring the year by year usage after 10,20,30,40,50,60,70 years at 7% growth the 1000 year resource has to get divided by 2,4,8,16,32,64,128 to determine the remaining life. So if we ignored all use for the first 70 years, then, after 70 years at 7% growth per annum, the 1000 year resource will only last 7.8 years. Once you factor in the actual year on year use, the resource was actually totally used up after about 64 years.

After 40 years, ignoring actual usage, a 250 year resource will only be good for 15.6 more years. Factor in the actual usage and the resource is gone before 40 years.

There is a crisis coming with oil, coal and a host of other resources so we need to replace virtually all our coal and oil fired generation within about 50 years anyway, particularly with the increasing usage of and China, India.

Cheers
Paul

It is indeed an intriguing idea controlling coal-fired greenhouse gas emissions by regulating the supply of coal, rather than at the point of emission.  On the other hand, it is a political non-starter globally (and probably domestically too):

"The vast majority of new power stations in China and India will be coal-fired; not "may be coal-fired"; will be. So developing carbon capture and storage technology is not optional, it is literally of the essence." --"Breaking the Climate Deadlock," Tony Blair, June 26, 2008

"(The) coal-dominated energy mix cannot be substantially changed in the near future, thus making the control of greenhouse gas emissions rather difficult," the (Chinese goverment "White") paper said. China is dependent on coal for about two thirds of its energy use, causing it to rise quickly in recent years to now rank alongside the United States as one of the world's top two emitters of greenhouse gases."  --"China says coal addiction makes climate change fight hard," AFP, 28 Oct '08

State-owned Coal India Ltd., part of a five-company consortium, is searching for coal mines in the United States, Canada, Australia and Indonesia to satisfy India's sharply rising demand for coal to feed its power plants. India already imports 50 million tons of coal every year, and its demand is projected to grow.   --Somini Sengupta, Business Standard, 23 October 2008

Building new coal-power plants in Germany means the country will miss government targets to cut carbon-dioxide emissions, the environmental ministry said, countering earlier claims by Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel.   --Jeremy van Loon, Bloomberg, 17 October 2008

Last month, John Hutton, the former business secretary, told the Labour Party conference that "no coal . . . equals no lights. No power. No future." --Robin Pagnamenta, The Times, 8 October 2008

By the way, controlling those coal-fired emissions by CCS is impractical too:

Vaclav Smil, an energy expert at the University of Manitoba, has estimated that capturing and burying just 10 percent of the carbon dioxide emitted over a year from coal-fire plants at current rates would require moving volumes of compressed carbon dioxide greater than the total annual flow of oil worldwide -- a massive undertaking requiring decades and trillions of dollars. "Beware of the scale," he stressed."

"I'm going to tell you something I probably shouldn't: we may not be able to stop global warming. We need to begin curbing global greenhouse emissions right now, but more than a decade after the signing of the Kyoto Protocol, the world has utterly failed to do so. Unless the geopolitics of global warming change soon, the Hail Mary pass of geoengineering might become our best shot." --Bryan Walsh, Time Magazine, 17 March 2008

The use of coal in UK electricity production supplied to households, business and factories was up 10.1 per cent on the equivalent period in 2007, while the use of natural gas fell sharply against the backdrop of higher energy prices, government figures released on Thursday show. --Point Carbon, 28 August 2008

The world has limitless supplies of coal, most located in nations friendly to the West. But coal is an abomination in the eyes of environmentalists because of its alleged contribution to global warming. Nevertheless, it will be a key ingredient in the world's energy future: India and China between them have 700 plants planned or under construction; the Government has sensibly authorised a new plant in Kent; and European countries plan to build 50 new coal stations in the next five years. --Irwin Stelzer, The Daily Telegraph, 6 August 2008

"A dramatic warning that "all is lost on global warming" unless the world finds a new clean coal technology in the next few years has been made by the UK energy minister, Malcolm Wicks...World demand for coal is projected to rise by 70% by 2030, an average annual rate of 2.2%, and the bulk of the rise will come from India and China. "China is a nation built on coal, so the idea that if we showed some kind of lead and we in Britain say no to coal and China will say 'OK we will follow' is just daft."  --"Wicks: All is lost on global warming without clean coal," The Guardian, 8 Aug, '08

Abu Dhabi (largest of the seven UAE emirates) has announced that it will switch to coal-fired power plants. Dubai (the second largest) is already building four of them - with a combined output of 4,000 megawatts - as a first-phase investment in coal. Apart from the United Arab Emirates, Oman (widely regarded as "the next Dubai") has signed a contract with South Korea for the construction of several coal-fired plants. Beyond the Gulf, Egypt proposes to build its first coal-fired plant on the shores of the Red Sea. Russia has announced plans to build more than 30 coal-fired plants by 2011. --Neil Reynolds, The Globe and Mail, 18 July 2008

You know I could continue citing these type of quotes all day.  Frankly, if you don't "get it" now, then I give up.

The attempt to cut coal burning by isolating a fraction of US reserves
is rather missing the point.

To gain sufficient political clout to achieve even a marginal effect just within the US, let alone in the other 80% of usage by the rest of the world, would consume massive civil society efforts.
As looming energy shortages bite, any politician trying to maintain those coal reserves' isolation would, quite predictably, be voted out.
Note that Obama, who is keen but practical, has not mentioned this patently unsustainable option.

Were this option to be applied succesfully, its main effect would be to raise world coal prices.
All well and good - say some of the dissidents of the planet's wealthiest state !

And if you're born into a poor country, or are particularly poor within the US - how do you feel about coal and coal-fired power becoming unaffordable ? Or when your child dies in surgery because the hospital has a blackout due to national fuel shortages ?

The point is, surely, that for all nations to co-operate in controlling GHGs effectively, without which we cannot succeed or even survive as a civilization, equity of the means applied is a prerequisite for the negotiations.

A proposal for pricing poor people out of the market is simply a non-starter - quite apart from being of pretty dubious morality.