I sort of agree but disagree slightly with the idea she 'destroyed' these industries. What she did was finally remove the distortion which was preventing the free market to decide the viability of these mines.
If you want to reduce global emissions of CO2, you need to make cheaper alternatives available. Let market mechanics do their normal thing. Companies want to be profitable, and will only care about what impacts that. Margaret Thatcher abolished the subsidies that were artificially propping up the coal mines, which allowed the free market to do its thing and cause otherwise unprofitable mines to close. Likewise with oil, if you subsidise oil production, then you are artificially making sites that would otherwise be nonviable viable. Making nonviable sites viable through subsidies increases supply and thus reduces prices. In turn, other technologies that might be competitive become nonviable which stymies development in those alternative technologies.
In my view, every industry should be able to stand on its own two feet. If it can't then let it fail, if the demand is still there an alternative will take its place. Yes it will hurt industries and communities, help them re-train and move into a viable industry. With the billions saved in subsidies you don't have to pay it'll probably end up cheaper to do that anyway, and you may end up with significantly better technologies that would otherwise have been stuck in universities and labs.
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