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It’s The Homeland, Stupid.
Global Warming Is Not The Only Environmental Issue

By Eastan McNeal on December 9, 2009 at 3:30 PM in Current Affairs, Environment

“Kennedy calls mountaintop removal mining a crime.” – WaPo Dec 7, 2009.   While the Capital Power Plant buys carbon credits from the Chicago Climate Exchange, so it can burn West Virginia coal to heat The Hill, the state is being blown up, its mountains leveled, its water ruined and its people displaced.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. captured Anti-Mountaintop Removal (MTR) rally attendees Monday by calling out corrupt politicians.

RFK:   What do you call them?     Audience: TERRORISTS!     (12/7/09)

The counter protesters showed up with their coal trucks, blowing their horns to try to drown out Kennedy. But RFK Jr is not intimidated easily. NQ Readers may recall that he has not pulled punches on Washington politicians in the past, calling them indentured servants to coal. And this is no different. He lays out the coal industry and their “captured” politicians and agencies.

Mountaintop removal (MTR) mining is a form of strip mining in which coal companies use explosives to blast as much as 800 to 1000 feet off the tops of mountains in order to reach the coal seams that lie underneath.

The resulting millions of tons of waste rock, dirt, and vegetation are then dumped into surrounding valleys, burying miles and miles of streams under piles of rubble hundreds of feet deep.

It seems appropriate to open a discussion about ClimateGate and how people who care about the quality of OUR air, water and land may want to insulate themselves from the CO2 argument about to erupt, here and in Europe, and the distraction it may cause.

For the average American, this (the MTR battle) should be more important than following a bunch of fat cats cruising around Copenhagen in their limos.

Friends in Appalachia are very concerned about the method being used by coal companies to extract the black diamonds powering America – Coal extraction via Mountaintop Removal. The smut (coal mixed with dirt) and the slurry (murky water left over by washing the dirt from the coal, stored in slurry ponds that have broken in the past and killed people in WV, TN and KY) bleed into the water supply and the most biodiverse forests in America are being destroyed. That is part of their position.

This is what a West Virginia mountain view looks like.

NiceMountain

The position of the coal companies has been jobs for strip miners and they provide talking points to their employees and advocates. Since one of the arguments made by environmentalists not living in the mountains is “burning coal contributes to global warming,” it probably will not be long until the coal companies will try to paint the anti-MTR groups into a corner surrounded by those who may use the global warming data controversy to discredit the cause of the environmentalists who are simply trying to save their mountains – not the world.

This is what a mountain range looks like after MTR.

BadMountainPhoto credit: Vivian Stockman, OHVEC.org

RFK:     It is a Crime!    .. But we are not intimidated by the fact that we have corrupt politicians..     (12/7/09)

Sending U.S. tax money to China, India and emerging countries to fight global warming might be worthwhile. It might not be. But all of that consideration for the future does not change the fact that blowing up mountains here today is an unforgivable crime. It is a fact that is not altered by any global warming debate. Here is another clip from the RFK 12/7/09 rally.

“We are not fighting for the environment for the sake of the fishes and the birds. We’re fighting for it because we understand that nature is the infrastructure of our communities. If, on the other hand we .. treat the planet as if it were a business in liquidation, convert our natural resources to cash as quickly as possible, have a few years of pollution based prosperity we can generate an instantaneous cash flow and the illusion of a prosperous economy but our children are going to pay for our joy ride. Environmental injury is deficit spending. It’s a way of selfishly loading the cost of our prosperity on to the backs of our children.”

Mr. Kennedy, thank you for that Powerful Argument.

The people of Appalachia plan on continuing to remind others that, if this destruction was happening in Beverly Hills, it would not be happening. Visit PatchworkFilms.com to learn more about the battle to save the mountains. And, by the way, on Tuesday the Copenhagen attendees saw a presentation on MTR delivered by http://savecoalrivermountain.org.

  • http://noquarter foxyladi14

    I LOVE THIS MAN go Bobby!!!!!!!!!

    • Eastan McNeal

      I like that he is is own man. He did not endorse The One during the primary and he has no problem telling it like it is today.

      • tek

        If you ever get a chance to hear him speak, GO! He’s impressive. Hillary should have been prez and he should have been VP. Instead of that weenie who’s living in the WH.

        • Scout

          Maybe that can still come to pass.

  • Docelder

    They do the same thing in Florida mining phosphate, except they dig holes. But since when do Kennedys give a whit about West Virginia. It isn’t like there are a whole lot of jobs there… it isn’t like there are a whole lot of jobs anywhere… except maybe China.

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/weblogs/back-story/2009/dec/09/coal-company-cuts-500-jobs-blames-environmentalist/

    Or, is the idea to make coal too expensive to use? I wonder.

    • Eastan McNeal

      Coal company always blame the locals and protesters. Fact is coal is stockpiled around the country because, using MTR, the companies extracted too much coal too fast for the market to absorb. When challenged by shareholders on why they shut down mines the coal execs always say “market conditions.”

    • tek

      Docelder: RFK, Jr. cares about West Virginia because it’s part of the United States. He’s a man in the mold of Bill and Hillary Clinton. He cares about this country. What are you talking about “making coal to expensive for anyone to use?” Talk to people from WV, any people. They hate what’s happening to their state.

      • Docelder

        I am a closet greenie in a lot of ways. But, I am just not buying this. I think the timing is suspect and I think it’s about the carbon and the coal and not the landscape. Meanwhile, we still need coal for electricity production and there is no more affordable source to replace coal right now. We are a long, long way from solar cells and wind turbines and in the meantime, all of us including the greenies are going to be using power. There is no way around that. We can make sure the mining companies restore the topsoil and replant trees. But suing the mining companies into making mining unprofitable is the same as paper terrorism. Meanwhile 500 more West Virginia families are losing paying jobs. Think about that the next time somebody makes fun of West Virginia because they are a poor state.

        • NomNomNom

          “…restore the topsoil and replant trees.”
          Would that were possible, but it is not: even if the mining companies were willing and accepted regulation, and they do not.
          All soil is not created equal: soil develops from parent material in layers called horizons in accordance with the climate, topography, presence of microorganisms and other organic life over time: vast aeons of time. Organic matter in soils accumulates very slowly and only under specific conditions. A couple of inches of real topsoil (not the stuff in a bag at garden centers) O/ dark A horizon material might take a thousand years to develop.
          The trees and plants that grow there require specific soil. (Appalachian soils are mostly inceptisols and ultisols). That is to say, the soil must hold an appropriate supply of the right nutrients which also means it must have a correct pH so that these minerals are in available form for uptake: wrong pH, plant can’t uptake what it needs and toxic ions may be put into solution (~all plant nutrients must be uptaken via soil solution/water via several mechanisms in plants). Also for any given species of plant, the soil texture must be appropriate, and its water holding capacity, its drainage, and its permeability, its various horizon depths, its microorganisms, its associated animals that disperse its seeds…
          After the mountain has been blown up, none of this exists any more.
          The mining companies have blasted back to the R horizons: there’s nothing but rock there. The streams that gave it life are obliterated; ground water and surface waters that fall upon the moonscape are horribly acidified from mining wastes. The animals that lived there were blown into a million pieces; the plants that were there are likewise annihilated. There’s no longer anything contributing to soil formation. It’s a moonscape. It’s worse than a moonscape: it is a toxic wasteland. Animals that wander in, seeds that are blown in can’t live there.
          You can’t chuck a couple of feet of dirt on top and some stinking liriope seeds and call it fixed. For the habitat to exist that was there previously, one needs the entire set of conditions that existed on the mountain.
          Also, where does topsoil come from but living ecosystems? Does one really want to take it from somewhere else, anyhow? Because this is also poor stewardship.

          These companies did this to make as much money as possible. There are no laws demanding restoration of mtr sites. Instead there is remediation. Remediation does not mean restoration: it means turning now-flat-used-to-be-mountains of life into F#CKING WALMARTS or parking lots that pay taxes: because that’s the definition of remediation: providing “value”. Only ~5% of mtr sites have been “remediated”. NONE of them have been restored, because the MOUNTAINS ARE GONE.

          Also: mtr mining costs jobs, it does not create them: it is overwhelmingly automated and over half of the mining jobs are now gone, permanently. West Virginians also can have good and far safer jobs via tourism. Mtr kills this opportunity. My family has lived in the Appalachians for ~300 years in WV & NC. No one has the right to destroy whole mountains for greed.

  • andrew

    Coal industry advocates suggest MTR sites are “restored” once the coal has been extracted.

    Oddly, I can’t seem to find any examples of that. I can find plenty of examples of abandoned sites with vast fields of smut and lakes of slurry temporarily held back by deteriorating dams, however. Once they’ve taken the coal they bug out and move on. The mess they leave behind becomes somebody else’s problem.

  • Tricia

    Wonderful and informative post. Thank you!!! I love Bobby K also.

    I will visit Pathwork films to learn more about this. I have driven through Appalachia and it is so beautiful. I want it to stay that way.

  • Eastan McNeal

    Thank you Tricia. Visit those folks often and enjoy nature. .. while it is still there.

    Andrew. You are right. There are sludge ponds, holding billions of gallons of poison set right above elementary schools. One broke recently in TN. If those ponds were put in above the Obama girls’ school they would be shut down today. But, the president has not been to WV, except to visit with coal operators in early 2008 as a candidate. He has never seen any of this himself.

  • Peggy Sue

    One need only look at the history of Big Coal to realize how irresponsible these companies have truly been–to the environment, local populations and the health and safety of miners. I’ve been doing research for a personal project and the destruction of lives and land is depressingly similar at the turn of the century [1900] to the 1930s to the 1970s to the present.

    Is this criminal? You would think. So, as the band plays loud in Copehagen and everyone gets a warm, fuzzy feel over how concerned they are, how good they are, how Mother Earth is the focus of all the world’s leaders, we can see in these pictures how shallow that commitment truly is. It’s about money and power. And, oh yes, the climate and environment.

    Pretty sickening. And good for Bobby Kennedy Jr. for calling them out.

    • Eastan McNeal

      On the Patchwork youtube page is a long version of Bobby Kennedy Jr’s 12/7 speech and he addresses how all the well known banking names in NY stole the land and the industry at the turn of that century. http://www.youtube.com/patchwork http://www.youtube.com/patchworkfilms

      Tho Kennedy is known for his voice also on global warming (see below) he chose to spend Monday with the people in WV, because as he says in the longer version of his talk, he learned about the WV people first hand when his father was fighting strip mining and the union thugs would drive by their house blowing their horns and trying to intimidate the family. BTW. Here is part of his quote, when he endorse Hillary:

      “I watched proudly as Hillary won over New Yorkers across the state in her race for the Senate seat my father once held,” Kennedy said in a statement. “Since then, she’s been reelected in a landslide victory and proven that she is ready to lead this nation from her first day in office. Hillary will inspire the real change America needs.”

      He added that Clinton had the “strength and experience” to end the war in Iraq and address the impact of global warming.

      Kennedy, an attorney for the Hudson Riverkeeper and president of Waterkeeper Alliance, is perhaps best known for his environmental activism.

      • Eastan McNeal
      • Peggy Sue

        Thanks for the link, Easton.

        Btw, I’m not a Climate/GW denier but I am a skeptic in terms of the alarmist nature of the movement and what if anything Cap and Trade will do [very little in my estimation beyond making the ususal subjects filthy rich]. In fact, Bloomberg had an interesting item regarding the the woman [Blythe Masters] who crafted the infamous credit default swaps into being for JP Morgan and who is now busy at work creating “carbon derivatives.”

        What could wrong??? :0)

        The history of the coal industry is beyond appalling. While researching, I picked up an interesting take from a young West Virginian in the 20′s when the unions were trying to get a foothold. He said something to the effect:

        We’ve had way too much helping, Mister. First, the Railroad Co. came in and helped us by taking our land. Then the coal companies came and helped, giving us jobs in their collapsing mines. And now you [the union] is helping us all get killed. I gotta tell you, Mister, we’re about all helped out.

        That about says it all.

        • Peggy Sue

          PS: Just watched the clip. That is a devastating piece of film. And that sludge dump? Ask the people in Harriman, TN what they thing about that.

          And the beat goes on!

          • Ferd Berfle

            We hate it here in Harriman. TVA has been a good neghbor for the most part, but this berm-break could have been avoided.

            • Ferd Berfle

              And actually, the break is in Kingston TN, just down the hill from us.

              • Peggy Sue

                Sorry for the geography blip, Ferd [I need to get a map :0)].

                I was in Philly when the break happened. God awful.

        • Eastan McNeal

          All helped out. I will share little story that with BJ, the filmmaker.

  • Elizabeth

    It is way past time for a resolution to this mess.
    I have some hope based on recent comments from Sens. Byrd and Rockefeller rebuke to the industry over health care that the politicians’ games are coming to a head and they will be forced to pay attention and do something.

    Right now coal is still pretty much the only game in town in the southern part of the state but jf miners and people who want to end mountaintop removal focused their energy on the perpetrators, (i.e. state & federal agencies that issue illegal permits, politicians who stay in office because their political campaigns are “funded” by the coal industry, and coal companies that somehow have believe they are above the law and regulation)-–then maybe, the people, all the people, could find a greater measure of justice and prosperity.

    • Eastan McNeal

      I don’t know if the constant pressure from the activists, who now target government and politicians as much as the coal industry, or if he is trying to rewrite his legacy. This op-ed from Sen Byrd, once the strongest coal supporter in the nation, has a lot of people scratching their heads:

      Dec. 3 (2009) –Senator Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., said the coal industry needs to stop using “fear mongering, grandstanding and outrage as a strategy” and instead get ready to help stave off global climate change and curb mountaintop removal mining. “As your United States Senator, I must represent the opinions and the best interests of the entire Mountain State, not just those interests of coal operators and southern coalfield residents who may be strident supporters of mountaintop removal mining,” Byrd said.

  • Becky

    Bobby Jr., Hillary, and Bill. the only politicians I still trust. oh, maybe my Senator, Russ F. too.

    • NomNomNom

      Hillary Clinton refused to rule out continuing mtr during the primaries.
      http://www.wvablue.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=1917
      She was also a proponent of the (nonexistent) clean coal.
      http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/08/20/clinton_qa/

    • jbjd

      …and Representatives Marcy Kaptur and Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)…

      • Eastan McNeal

        John McCain was the one who promised that he would end MTR on day one. Chelsia, on behalf of her mother, said the same. But, alas, I did not hear Hillary say it herself.

        And clean coal is like the belief that you can wash the manure off of a cow pile.

        • sowsear

          Or that you can pick up a turd by the clean end.

        • jbjd

          EMc, I was commenting on Becky’s comment about elected officials she trusted.

  • http://N/A breeze

    O/T

    KING OBAMA V. QUEEN CLINTON
    CHECK OR CHECKMATE?

    By Colleen O’Connor,
    SDNN -Monday, December 7, 2009 27

    Chess is a war game.

    You win by playing your opponent, not the game.

    The patient, wily, and deft player often triumphs more frequently than the flashy, lightening quick one.

    A grand master will pick off the pawns as they cross into enemy territory and then concentrate on checking the King.

    The Queen has the greatest maneuverability of all the chess pieces. She can be the most lethal.

    The King, by contrast, is often barricaded behind a wall of defenders, with little room to escape-save in a bold and risky fashion.

    The King is dying. Long live the Queen.

    Read more: http://www.sdnn.com/sandiego/2009-12-07/politics-city-county-government/politics-opinion/oconnor-king-obama-v-queen-clinton-check-or-checkmate#ixzz0ZEmsBJGW

  • creeper

    It isn’t just mountaintop removals. Here in the Midwest there were dozens of strip mines up until the seventies. The coal taken out of them was high-sulfur and they were some of the first mines to fall to EPA regulations.

    While the mines were in operation the area they encompassed looked like a moonscape. Long, parallel strips looked almost like waves on an ocean. Topsoil that had been removed was sold off and tailings either distributed in spoil ridges between the strips or piled at the ends. Nothing grew on the soil that was left because it bore absolutely no relation to what had been removed to get at the coal.

    Many of those mines have now undergone “reclamation”. The worst of the furrows are filled in with tailings bulldozed into the trenches. But what emerges isn’t even remotely comparable to what was destroyed. The soil left is utterly changed and in many cases won’t support native vegetation. In areas where a trench remains it fills in with water, which turns a pale whitish-blue. One needs only a quick glance to know that “reclamation” is a far cry from complete restoration.

    Once in a rare while we’ll see a mine that had the overlay (original topsoil) saved and then restored to the surface. The difference there is like night and day. Native plants flourish and water flows clear.

    I’ve argued long and hard on other blogs for the intelligent use of coal. It’s behavior like I’ve described above on the part of the coal-mining companies that makes my argument so difficult.

    • Eastan McNeal

      Each place has its special contributions that we should not have permission to forever remove.

      RFK, Jr: “..during the Pleistocene ice age 20,000 years ago .. North America turned into a tundra where there was no forest. And the last refuge for those forests was the Appalachian Mountains. And when the tundras and glaciers withdrew, all of America was reseeded from the seed stock in those forests. So it’s the mother forest of all north America, and that’s why it’s the most diverse and abundant temperate forest in the world. Because it’s the longest living. And today, these mining companies with the help of their indentured servants in the White House are doing what those glaciers couldn’t accomplish. What the Pleistocene Ice Age couldn’t accomplish which is to flatten the Appalachian mountains and destroys those forests.”

  • creeper

    It isn’t just mountaintop removals. Here in my little patch of the Midwest there were dozens of strip mines up until the seventies. The coal taken out of them was high-sulfur and they were some of the first mines to fall to EPA regulations.

    While the mines were in operation the area they encompassed looked like a moonscape. Long, parallel strips looked almost like waves on an ocean. Topsoil that had been removed was sold off and tailings either distributed in spoil ridges between the strips or piled at the ends. Nothing grew on the soil that was left because it bore absolutely no relation to what had been removed to get at the coal.

    Many of those mines have now undergone “reclamation”. The worst of the furrows are filled in with tailings bulldozed into the trenches. But what emerges isn’t even remotely comparable to what was destroyed. The soil left is utterly changed and in many cases won’t support native vegetation. In areas where a trench remains it fills in with water, which turns a pale whitish-blue. One needs only a quick glance to know that “reclamation” is a far cry from complete restoration.

    Once in a rare while we’ll see a mine that had the overlay (original topsoil) saved and then restored to the surface. The difference there is like night and day. Native plants flourish and water flows clear.

    I’ve argued long and hard on other blogs for the intelligent use of coal. It’s behavior like I’ve described above on the part of the coal-mining companies that makes my argument so difficult.

    • creeper

      My apologies for the double post. I tried to stop the first for an edit. Didn’t work.

  • glennmcgahee

    You really have to be aware of wolves in sheep’s clothing. Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee (Home of the Smoky Mountains and at the foot of the Appalachian Trail) has a lobby and issue group that’s called Save the Mountains or some such misnomer but in actuality, he has fought the building of wind powered turbines saying they ruined the mountain views yet I’ve never heard him object to strip mining or MTR.

  • Cathy in Ks.

    This excellent post and the comments have raised my awareness about this issue of MTR. I also salute RFK, Jr. for what he is doing. He reminds me of his father – a courageous and sincere man.

  • mountainaires

    Thanks Eastan! I always look forward to your posts on the DESTRUCTION of our beautiful, singularly unique Appalachian Mountains, which I love with all my heart. I wish I could have been there to hear Kennedy’s speech in person, but could not be, so I spent my money to help support the cause. Bought the CD and DVD Coal Country music and documentary; it’s not much, I know. Wish I could do more.

    I’m so grateful to Sen. Alexander for his work on this issue, and it makes me proud that he’s one of my Senators. I support him and let him know that.

    It is disgusting to me, heartbreaking to me, outrageous to me, that Americans will allow this nightmare to continue–endangering our own natural beauty and killing clean water, destroying people, trees and our natural treasures–the breathtaking beauty of the Blue Ridge, Appalachian Mountains.

  • Hot Librarian

    Coal mining is not necessarily bad. I live in a beautiful coal area with a working coke mine. I can dig up coal in my yard!

    I love to see the coal trains rumble by.

    Coal gave us the Industrial Revolution. Mans greatest achievement.

    We just gotta do it better .