The Tennessee Valley Authority had been warned for years that toxic coal ash could spill out of its retention ponds and into nearby waterways, but managers ignored those warnings, the agency's inspector general said in a report issued last week.
In December, 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash at the TVA's Kingston Fossil Plant spilled out from a retaining pond. The ash polluted Tennessee's Emory River and swamped nearby homes.
Spoleto, Umbria--When President Barack Obama trundled into the bel
paese of Italy for the G8 gathering last month, some of my neighbors in
the verdant hills of Umbria were surprised to learn about their
country's small but lingering dependence on coal-fired plants. Draping
banners down five coal-fired towers of carbon emissions that week,
Greenpeace reminded the European gathering--and President Obama--of the
inconvenient reality of coal.
Mired in the acrobatics of
regulatory doublespeak, the Obama administration's increasing oversight
of the unbearable daily toll on Appalachian coalfield residents from
mountaintop removal begs the question: Are Obama's well-meaning but
irresolute environmental administrators abetting the crimes of human
rights violations and historicide?
A Wise County, Va., woman is among the stars of a controversial film on mountaintop removal mining that premieres today in Charleston, W.Va.
The film, “Coal Country,” looks at the negative effects of surface coal mining on Appalachian residents and communities in four states. Kathy Selvage, a Wise County activist opposed to mining practices used in the region, is among those featured in the documentary.
Mountaintop removal coal mining is the worst environmental tragedy in
American history. When will the Obama administration finally stop this
Appalachian apocalypse?
As a groundbreaking clean energy counterpart to this summer's
extraordinary Food, Inc. documentary on the agribusiness, the
long-awaited "Coal Country" movie on the cradle-to-grave process of
generating our coal-fired electricity will be hitting the theatres next
week with the big bang of an ammonium nitrate/fuel oil explosive.
And Big Coal ain't happy.
Here's the trailer:
Dear Al Gore:
Your long-time work on climate destabilization has triggered a sea change in how our nation tackles the impending crisis of global warming. I deeply admire and appreciate your commitment to an urgent issue that transcends borders, and affects the fate of our children's future.
As a father and grandfather raising a family in the great forests of the Appalachian coalfields, where my family has been rooted since the 1830s, I am writing you in a time of similar urgency.
I'll say one thing about today's politicians: They have given whole new meaning to the term "stimulus package."
Democrat or Republican, gay or straight, our public leaders seem to have a proclivity for unseemly and costly behavior. And when I think of the shenanigans they're pulling and the lies they are telling their families, I do wonder how so many powerful public figures can be simultaneously so self-absorbed and so astonishingly stupid.
(Bloggers across the nation are
making a joint request this Sunday: It is time for President Barack
Obama and CEQ chief Nancy Sutley to make their FIRST visit to a
mountaintop removal moonscape and coal slurry impoundment and bear
witness to the impact of the Obama administration's regulatory
strip-mining policies on affected coalfield residents. For other posts,
see Deviltower's DailyKos roundup: http://devilstower.dailykos.com/ )
