This is just amazing!!!! Frankly, we are speechless. While we waited in the halls of Congress for a Senate hearing to begin, our friend Will Harlan ran 72 miles along the TN-NC border to raise awareness! Thanks so much for your support, Will!

On June 25th, I completed a 72-mile, end-to-end run across Great Smoky Mountains National Park in just under 17 hours, a speed record. However, the real goal was to help bring an end to the devastating and deadly effects of mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia and to promote iLoveMountains.org. My crew distributed information about ilovemountains.org at popular trailheads during the run, and we wore iLoveMountains.org t-shirts for the entire run.

I have launched Miles for Mountains as a way to get hikers, runners, walkers, and other outdoor enthusiasts actively involved in ending mountaintop removal. The basic concept is for people to dedicate their mileage–whether it’s on a treadmill or on the trail–toward a collective goal of one million miles to end mountnaintop removal–a virtual million-mile march.

So to all you runners out there, you heard the man…. lace up and start telling the world about mountaintop removal coal mining.

PS. Will also happens to be the Editor of Blue Ridge Outdoors Magazine, the definitive guide to outdoor sports, health, and adventure travel in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic.

On Thursday, July 25, over seventy supporters of the Appalachia Restoration Act (S 696) lined up outside the door of Dirksen Senate Building for a hearing on the bill. The hearing, held by the Committee on Environment and Public Works’ Subcommittee on Water and Wildlife, was conducted by subcommittee chair Senator Ben Cardin, also a co-founder of the bill.

The Appalachian Restoration Act (S 696) is a Senate-sponsored bill to amend the Clean Water Act, outlawing the dumping of mining waste into streams. A 2002 change to the Clean Water Act by the Bush administration made it legal to dump mining waste into streams.

The bill would effectively eliminate the mountaintop removal coal mining practice of valley fills.

“Coal is important to America,” said Senator Cardin. “It is important to recognize the importance of energy needs in America. But we are talking about one type of coal mining here – mountaintop removal coal mining – and its impact on the water quality of America.”





“Saving our mountains is important to me, whether we are talking about cleaning up our streams, or ending the practice of blowing up mountaintops and dumping the waste into streams,” he said.

Two panels of witnesses provided testimony for the hearing, including EPA Region 3 Director Jon Pomponio, water quality expert Dr. Margaret Palmer from the University of Maryland, Paul Sloane, Deputy Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, and Randy Huffman, Cabinet Secretary of the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection.

During Dr. Palmer’s testimony, she indicated that there is “irrefutable evidence that impacts to streams from mountaintop removal [coal mining] is devastating. As headwaters are lost, cumulative effects in streams and rivers below are devastating.” When asked by the Senate panel how effective remedial programs would be to mitigate the damage, Palmer noted that there is no knowledge of an effective way to reverse the damage caused to streams, and that known impacts have been in continuance in some places for close to 50 years.

“When you take the top of a mountain off, you have fundamentally altered the hydrology of that mountain,” she said.

Paul Sloane, Deputy Commissioner of TDEC, claimed that “nearly 70% of post mining land uses is forestry reclamation.” Senator Cardin countered that he was told by a Virginia Tech professor that less than 1% of the currently 5800 valley fills in West Virginia and Kentucky had actually been reclaimed.



After the hearing, West Virginia Coal Association vice president Chris Hamilton spoke with media in attendance, saying that he was “disappointed in the way this was set up and organized. Those opposing [mountaintop mining] had four witnesses, and supporters [of coal] were virtually shut out of the process.”

“This bill [will impose] significant restrictions not only on mountaintop mining, but on surface and underground mining as well. I don’t think the answer is to abolish surface mining,” he added.

“The very concept of mountaintop removal is repugnant to me,” Senator Cardin said in an interview after the hearing. “This bill is about water quality. I’m not sure the mining companies are in the position to tell us about water quality.”

The next steps for the bill include the possibility of additional hearings in the subcommittee, followed by a vote. If the bill passes subcommittee, it will proceed to review by the full Environment and Public Works committee before passing to a full Senate vote.

To view an archived webcast of the entire hearing, visit the Senate website or click here to watch it now!

News coverage of yesterdays Senate hearing on mountaintop removal coal mining:

The best headline thus far was printed before the hearing even started:
Washington City Paper – Mountaintop Coal Mining Face Off Starts Now!

As always, Ken Ward’s Coal Tattoo blog provided the most comprehensive coverage and analysis:
Mountaintop Removal: Jobs vs. Mayflies? NOT

Here’s a preliminary roundup of hearing coverage:

1. McClatchy Newspapers – Lawmakers, activists battle over mountaintop removal coal mining
2. Clear Skies TV – Mountaintop Removal Hearing
3. CBS 13 WOWK, West Virginia – Mountaintop Mining Debate Reaches Capitol Hill
4. CBS 59 WVNS – Debate Continues in Washington on Mountaintop Removal Mining
5. ABC 3 WHSV – Environmental Official Testifies on Mountaintop Mining and Water Quality
6. WV Metronews – Can We Really Keep Doing This?

And a few photos from the event. More can be found on our Flickr page:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationalmemorialforthemountains/sets/72157620455714735/

Citizens for Coal discuss the mountaintop removal coal mining issue with Cody Simpkins of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth.

Senator Ben Cardin, co-founder of the Appalachia Restoration Act (S 696) and chair of the Committee on Environment and Public Works’ subcommittee on Water and Wildlife, speaks to the media about the bill.

Close to two hundred people lined up for the Senate hearing on the Appalachia Restoration Act, from both sides of the mountaintop removal coal mining issue. Only about sixty were able to fit into the main Senate Committee chamber in Dirkson Senate Building; the rest were directed to an overflow room in a nearby senate building.

Close to two hundred people lined up for the Senate hearing on the Appalachia Restoration Act, from both sides of the mountaintop removal coal mining issue. The hearing was held in the Committee on Environment and Public Works’ subcommittee on Water and Wildlife. Some individuals waited in line for over three hours to secure a seat in the hearing.

Coalfield citizen statements about mountaintop removal mining:

Mickey McCoy, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth
Inez, KY – I am a 53 year old retired high school English teacher who was born and raised in Inez, Kentucky. Twenty five percent of my counties land area has been striped mined.

Our public water system in Martin County is polluted and our 100 year flood comes every 18 months. These problems are due to the coal industry and the greed of their corporate owners.

Mountain top removal continues to bomb the hell out of our mountains, our culture, and our future.

I’m here in DC to see if anybody gives a damn about the death of my land. I’m here to see if any elected officials care to stand for us against the destruction of the Appalachian Mountains. I am here for the last hope.

Cody Simpkins, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth
Morehead, KY – The people of Appalachia have struggled to find their voice for generations. Yet time after time we have been silenced buy our poverty and the overwhelming influence of the industrial forces that bring this poverty to our communities. For the first time our government is opening an ear to a main factor in the plight of Appalachia. Whether or not our voices will be heard is still left to be determined, but at least now we have a chance to open our mouths.

Matt Howard, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth
McGoffin County, KY – As a young person, born and raised in eastern Kentucky, I have many hopes and aspirations for my family and neighbors. I would like to see my people prosper, living long into their old age. In recent decades there has been an explosion in cancer rates among the human population the world over. It is obvious that we have brought this problem on ourselves. What we put into the land, air, and water, we unavoidably put into our own bodies. With Mountain Top Removal we are poisoning our water, and losing the rich soil that nourished our bodies for so long. We our selling the thing that truly sustains us, and funneling our wealth out of the region. What we are selling can never be replaced. This is the great tragedy of our time and region. I hope to see people embrace logic, and develop a thirst for knowledge. We should strive improve ourselves as individuals and as a society. This is what I want for our people.

Lorelei Scarbro—Coal River Mountain Watch
Rock Creek, WV – I am WV born and raised; in my family has been four generation of underground coal miners, including my husband who died of black lung. My home is threatened by a proposed mountaintop removal behind my home. Everything I have, including the cemetery where my husband is buried, is at risk. It’s my prayer that this committee learns the truth about how mountaintop removal is impacting the water in Appalachian communities. My biggest concern as a mother of four and as a grandmother is safe drinking water. I’m so concerned about the quality of water my granddaughter will have when she’s my age. People I know are already sick, dead, and dying because of mountaintop removal has on our water.

There is an alternative. In my community, the Coal River Valley in southwestern West Virginia, there is a 6,600 acre mountaintop removal site proposed for the mountain behind my home. Instead of this destruction, we are proposing a wind farm. Studies have shown that this would provide more jobs, more revenue for the county, and more electricity in the long run that the mountaintop removal project. This project would allow us to start re-building our community, and create safe, permanent jobs and clean energy forever. We need our government to step forward and support alternatives like the Coal River Wind project, and other investments in green jobs in communities that have been impacted by mountaintop removal.

David Beatty—Save Our Cumberland Mountains
Cumberland County, TN What I’ve been saying all along is that where I come from, so many jobs are pretty well gone, but you can still depend on tourism. If the water is messed up and the mountains are gone, we’ll lose that too. I see this mountaintop removal another threat to the economy, more than any other economic threat we face. The lawmakers need to respond, because while they may not care about our health, I know they care about the economy.

I was elected to the position of County Executive from 1998 to 2002. We focused on developing tourism because we saw that as the best economic option for our community. I see hope in this new green economy as an alternative we’ve never had before.

We used to have many jobs in underground mining – and a lot of our retired miners gave their health to the pollution inside the mine. They never dreamed they would now have to give up their land, their mountains and their lifestyle, to mountaintop removal mining.

The well water on my property was ruined by strip mining, and it is threatened by a new mountaintop removal site they are trying to put in. You used to be able to lean down and drink out of any stream, but now you don’t dare. People depend on their well water, because many don’t have access to city water. Bad water doesn’t just affect the tourist economy; it’s our health; it’s our life.

I see such an opportunity and such a serious threat. Investment in a green economy is our best opportunity to get Appalachia out of poverty, but we’ll never have that chance if we destroy our water and our health with mountaintop removal.

Jean Chealy –Save Our Cumberland Mountains
Cumberland County, TN – I am a retired school teacher and volunteer as the chair of our local chapter of SOCM. I have been to Washington to lobby against mountaintop removal before. Mountaintop removal is such an abomination, and we shouldn’t have to spend this much time and energy fighting it. The problems should be obvious to lawmakers, and they need to act to end mountaintop removal today.

In Tennessee, we now also have to fight the terrible impacts of TVA’s coal ash spill. TVA is hoping to dump huge amounts of the toxic coal ash waste onto a strip mine near my home in Cumberland County, TN. They bulldozed through our county commission and got the permits with out listening to citizen concerns. I got involved years ago because of the terrible blasting damages from this same strip mine they are now trying to dump their toxic coal ash into. So, now our health and our water are being threatened by the mining of coal and by the disposal of the toxic ash they make when they burn it.

Kathy Selvage, Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards
Wise, VA – We have so much to share with the people who might visit us. If we could only stop blasting away our mountains and dumping them into valleys and streambeds. Mountaintop removal is destroying the land, the people, and our cultural heritage. We could make it if only our elected leaders shared our vision, one that doesn’t concentrate on destruction, but instead on construction.

On Tuesday, June 23, a team from Appalachian Voices joined hundreds of people gathered at an anti-mountaintop removal coal mining rally at Marsh Fork Elementary School in West Virginia to protest the continuation of the destructive practice. The local and regional residents were joined by NASA climatologist James Hansen, who spoke about the contributions of mountaintop removal coal mining and coal-fired power plants to the problem of global warming.

Activist and actress Daryl Hannah, Rainforest Action Network Executive Director Michael Brune and renowned novelist Diane Giardina also spoke during the rally.

According to Hansen, 24,000 people die each year from illnesses caused by coal-fired power plants.

Novelist Denise Giardina, author of the book “Storming Heaven” about the battle of Blair Mountain, said during her speech, “We had coal mining for 70 years before mountaintop removal mining, and blowing up the top of a mountain is not coal mining.”

Protestors were met at the scene by employees of Massey Energy – who according to one source had been given the day off with pay to attend the rally and counter the protest – and their wives. The miners were dressed in work clothes with orange “Massey stripes” and carrying signs that said “Tree Huggers Go Home” and “We Love Mountains That Produce Coal.” Some miners shouted obsenities and taunts at protestors.

“The coal that is burned here [in West Virginia] is mined somewhere else, and the coal that is mind here is burned somewhere else,” said Rock Creek, WVa native Judy Bonds. “This is America. This is everyone’s problem.”

Rally attendees then marched half of a mile down the main road to the Massey coal processing plant entrance, singing “Amazing Grace” and other gospel songs. They were met by the line of Massey workers and wives chanting “Massey, Massey” and shouting at the protestors. Twenty-nine individuals who had chosen to risk arrest then sat down in the middle of the road, and climatologist Hansen read a request to Massey Energy asking the company to help with the climate change problem by ending mountaintop removal coal mining.

The activists were subsequently arrested for obstructing traffic. “Stop mountaintop removal and create a clean energy future,” said actress Daryl Hannah as she was lead away in handcuffs.

Among the arrested included 94-year-old Ken Heckler, former U.S. congressman and Secretary of State for West Virginia; James Hansen; Michael Brune, and numerous West Virginia residents including Lorelei Scarboro, Dana Kuhnline and Larry Gibson.

In the end result, the rally was peaceful, violence was avoided, and the majority of Massey’s coal production on the mountaintop removal site above the school was shut down for a day.

Quotes from the day:

“The blood of Native Americans and West Virginians is in these hills. The spirit of Native Americans and West Virginians is in these hills. We need to honor the Scotch Irish, honor the Germans and English, honor the Native Americans and Africans whose people are buried in these mountains. This is a war of the spirit.” Matt Charmin, Dakota Blackfoot Sioux

“We think there is a way to create long-term, sustainable jobs so you can feed your families.” Steve Owen, Executive Director, Appalachian Institute for Renewable Energy, speaking directly to the Massey Energy counter-protestors

“People went to jail so we wouldn’t have to work on weekends. People went to jail so women could have the right to vote…. [some of you are risking arrest today...] You have the right to remain silent, but now is the time to stand up for what you believe is right.” Steve Owen, Executive Director, Appalachian Institute for Renewable Energy

“Don Blankenship invited me here today, when he started blowing up mountains.” Michael Brune, Executive Director, Rainforest Action Network

Flickr Photostream available at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/appvoices/sets/72157620592562274/

This just in. Rob Perks of NRDC provides commentary on their blog, the Switchboard.

It does not bode well that the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday ruled 6-3 in favor of treating America’s waterways like dumps.  Specifically, the Court decided that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers can legally permit the disposal of polluted wastewater from a gold mine into an Alaskan lake.  The proposed Kensington Gold Mine, in the Berners Bay region near Juneau, would discharge 210,000 gallons per day of ‘treated’ mine tailings directly into Lower Slate Lake.  Over the course of the mine’s 10-15 years of operations, that adds up to about 4.5 million tons of toxic waste that will kill all the fish and nearly all other aquatic life.   

(Photo by J. Henry Fair)

I’m no lawyer, nor do I play one on TV, so feel free to analyze the gory details of this legal travesty in this article on the decision.  You can also read the New York Times coverage of the case here.

Now, the reason the Court sided with the Corps — and contrary to the purpose of the Clean Water Act — is because of a rule change invoked by the Bush administration back in 2002 that expanded the definition of the term ‘fill material’ to include mining waste.  This is the very same regulatory dirty trick that the Corps relies on to permit massive stream ‘valley fills’ in Appalachia associated with mountaintop removal coal mining.

But this disappointing Supreme Court ruling doesn’t have to be the end of the issue.  You see, the Obama administration can save that Alaskan lake from irrevocably pollution — and all the mountains and valleys in Appalachia from destruction — simply be reversing the bad Bush ‘fill’ rule.  Recent actions by the Obama administration to crack down on mountaintop removal fall far short of actually ending mountaintop removal, which is the only solution to this abomination. 

In addition, legislation pending in both houses of Congress would also effectively put a stop to mountaintop removal by overruling the 2002 fill rule — thereby preventing the Corps from permitting waste dumps in America’s waterways. This Thursday, the Senate will hold a hearing on one of those bills, the bi-partisan Appalachia Restoration Act (S. 696), co-sponsored by Sens. Ben Cardin (D-MD) and Lamar Alexander (R-TN).

I’ll be live blogging the Senate hearing.  Meantime, you can help by urging your Senators to support this bill.       

(Photo by J. Henry Fair)