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TechnoratiBlood Coal, Not 'Clean Coal'
It shouldn't go unnoticed that today, while the tragic aftermath of the mine collapse in Utah continues to unfold, the Bush Administration is unveiling new regulations making it easier for companies to remove mountaintops and strip mine for coal in America's heartland. The industry is claims that such coal is safe and green. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In fact, the coal industry, like an 80s celebrity desperate for a realty TV show comeback, is trying to reinvent its image as the nation wakes up to the fact that pollution is passé and conservation is the next big thing. Thus, introducing "clean coal". Which is to dirty coal what New Coke was to old Coke. Which is to say, not different at all. And that's the point.
If that wasn't obvious just on the basis of cynicism --- that the coal industry would do everything it could to seem green in terms of the environment in order to continue to make green in terms of cold, hard cash --- the events of recent weeks should alert us to the reality that big corporations often locate their best interests in their own pockets, not the lives and health of people.
The classic example is the Ford Pinto. In the 1970s, the Ford Motor Company learned that when the Pinto was hit from behind, there was a very good chance the gas tank would explode in a deadly fireball. Ford calculated that repairing each engine would cost $11. But they figured not every car would get in an accident and catch fire and, for those that did, not every wrongful death lawsuit would proceed. They calculated that paying out the successful lawsuits would cost less than repairing all the cars. So they kept the defect quiet. In all, 27 people died in Pinto fires.
When the owners of the Crandall Canyon mine in Huntington, Utah, proposed to resume operations in other sections of the mine as soon as possible while the community was still grieving less than a few days after the mining deaths, even federal regulators confessed they were "shocked that the subject was even brought up." But in an industry that makes its money by placing workers in extremely dangerous conditions, decimating our land and polluting our air, are we that surprised that they would put profits first and people last?
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, mining companies have found a "safer" way to extract coal from the earth. They blast off the tops of mountains in Appalachia, literally removing entire tops of mountain ranges to scrape at the coal that lies beneath. The leftovers are then dumped. The New York Times reported that a spokesman from the National Mining Association plainly stated that "unless mine owners were allowed to dump mine waste in streams and valleys it would be impossible to operate in mountainous regions like West Virginia that hold some of the richest low-sulfur coal seams." Naturally, the Bush Administration is easing federal regulations today to make that pollution easier. So then the coal companies can generate more pollution in order to get more coal that they can put in their coal plants and generate more pollution.
Meanwhile, throughout communities in Appalachia --- some of the poorest rural communities in the United States --- coal dust settles like a blanket everywhere. Researchers have proven that children living in these regions have abnormally high rates of asthma, diarrhea and vomiting. For instance, in the town of Rock Creek, West Virginia, the elementary school lies just 200 feet away from a 165-foot storage silo containing 2.8 billion gallons of toxic mining waste. In 1972, not too far from Rock Creek, a similar structure collapsed entirely, killing 125 people.
Coal isn't about electricity. Native American reservations in North and South Dakota alone have enough wind capacity to meet one-third of America's energy needs. Wind, solar and other technologies we have today are viable alternative sources of electricity, and conservation efforts could dramatically reduce our electricity demand in the first place. But to the coal industry, alternative energy is the real disaster. So the coal industry will do anything it can to procure coal as quickly and cheaply as possible, slapping a fresh coat of green paint on top to try and distract us from the harm caused to mine workers, Appalachian children and air that all of us need to breathe.
The trail of blood coal streaks bright red across the globe --- from Appalachia to Hungtingon, Utah, to Xintai, China, to Sago, West Virginia. We must reduce our consumption of electricity overall. And to meet our remaining energy needs, we must prioritize sources of energy such as wind and solar that don't place lives in danger. Coal is a dying industry, withering even faster than the planet and the communities it has infected. To relax mining standards at a time when the whole world is reeling from the tragedies of mining is a move that the Bush administration should be ashamed of and all of us should vigorously oppose.
Sally Kohn is the director of the Movement Vision Project, working with grassroots community-led organizations across the United States to identify our shared, long-term vision for the future.
7 Comments so far
Show AllFirst, I want to point out that here in West Virginia, the recent court case which ended with a decision that valley fills are illegal was greeted with a massive, emotional campaign of rallies, op-eds and letters to the editor about the poor miners whose jobs were threatened. This was the third such case--the first was overturned on a technicality and the second is till ongoing. It's quite true that all our politicians, however good they may be on other things (like Byrd ranting against Bush's wars and assaults on the Constitution) will bend over and raise their skirts for Coal every time.
Also want to mention our big battle right now, to nip in the bud the push to subsidize dirty new plants to make liquid fuels out of coal. They claim we don't have to worry about carbon dioxide because it can be sequestered--but the game they're playing, I think, is a sort of bait-and-switch--when you're worrying about greenhouse gases they talk about sequestration, but when they propose actual plants they don't want sequestration which is too expensive and unproven.
The rule change this article is about was first poposed a few years ago, but they backed off for awhile. They probably will shove through every such favor for industry, while they still have the power--so the Democrats can pretend to be clean.
VINCE LAWRENCE: Excellent posting. Do you recall a 60 Minutes episode where a very bold lawyer sued the EPA for not enforcing the laws (later overturned by a likely bought judge since big coal has the bucks to do deft behind-the-scenes legal wrangling).
As for the loss of postings. I have had that happen twice... so you are not imagining it. I was told there are spam filters, and there is someone who ultimately looks over the material to determine if it meets requirements. I am not sure what keywords activate their censors.
Something very odd going on on this site. Something or someone is preventing my participation here. Went looking for the NYT article posted here several days ago concerning "mountain-topping" and it seems to have disappeared from this site. Most of my posts disappear, never to be seen again. Trying not to get paranoid, but...
Concerning this article: As I stated in a comment on the NYT piece, the Surface Mice Reclamation Act, originally enacted in 1975, prohibits the methods and consequences attendant to the practice of "mountain-topping." Chip(above) repeats a premise stated by Jared Diamond in "Collapse." I read that excellent book also, but I would somewhat disagree with the Professor. I grew up in the coalfields of eastern Ohio and know firsthand that those at the top of "Old King Coal" have gotten very wealthy indeed.
b.t.w.: When the high sulfer content of the coal here made those operators go west for lower lower sulfer content but also lower btu coal, many of their coal rights holdings went to... (wait for it) - THE BIG OIL COMPANIES! That's right, when you wade through the holding companies and front companies what you will find is that big oil olso owns the rights to much of the coal still lying in the ground here.
Ms. Kohn would have done us a greater service if she had prepared a more serious piece without the hyperbole. She states coal is not about electricity. Wrong. It is indeed about electricity and will be for quite some time, and we'd better come up with better arguments than the ones she makes here.
The real disaster of "mountain-topping" is not the levelling of mountains but of dumping the removed overburden in the upper reaches of the dendretic stream networks. Those upper reaches are the natural filters that cleanse the surface drainage. "Mountain-topping," if allowed to continue, will result in the destruction of some of the most important aquifers of the east, and by consequence, an entire ecosystem.
Where are those powerful bastions of liberalism and the Democratic Party, the Hons. Rockefeller and Byrd, on this ongoing destruction? Why, in bed with the coal operators of course.
Blowing up Mountains to get at the coal?Then them poor coal companies sell their coal to pollute the world's oceans ,kill forests and give each man woman and child a shot of mercury they don't need.
As usual everyone only thinks about today never what happen yesterday or what will likely happen tomorrow.
You know why the coal companies get to blow up mountains? Because You and I let them.
You got you air conditioning up all the way?
How many lights you got on in your house?
And So On And So On
Create less of a demand for coal and save a few mountaintops
CHIP: Your idea is a much easier one for Earth Mother, too... imagine HER clean-up costs!
Mining is not very profitable. The mining industry operates on extremely slim profits (if at all). Also, most mines don't actually clean up the environmental messes they create. Sure, they are supposed to. But the CEOs frequently give themselves multi-million dollar bonuses and declare bankruptcy (not kidding - read Collapse by Jared Diamond).
And who gets stuck with the bill to clean up the mess? Taxpayers. We would be better off paying all the would-be mine workers $30k a year for the next 10 years (for doing nothing) rather than letting the mines open. We would save hundreds of millions of dollars.
The United States is the Saudi Arabia of coal. We have enough coal to kill the world with global warming. Natural gas is an alternative that can scale quickly, much fast than wind and solar in the near term. Solar can displace natural gas in the long term.
Kill coal.