Nancy Sutley, Head of Obama’s Council on Environmental Quality, speaks on Mountaintop Removal

Unofficial transcript on mountaintop removal question:

I think everybody acknowledges it, the President has said it, everybody we talk to acknowledges that there are serious impacts associated with mountaintop mining and we have to address that. Going forward we have to look at what we can do under existing authority to strengthen the oversight of these projects and to see that we are using those authorities fully to try to address the environmental impacts of mountaintop mining. So, does it mean fewer projects? I don’t know the answer to that. But it will mean that we will deal with the environmental impacts of those projects.

If that is the question, then the answer is easy. Dealing with the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal means there will be fewer projects. In fact, it means there will be zero mountaintop removal projects. No amount of regulation can make it environmentally sound, economically practical, or ecologically beneficial to blast the tops of of our mountains and dump the waste into our streams. Dealing with the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal means that we stop the practice. Its that simple.

About JW Randolph

Raised on the banks of the Tennessee River, JW's work to create progress in his home state and throughout Appalachia has been featured on the Rachel Maddow Show, The Daily Kos and Grist. He served first as Appalachian Voices’ Legislative Associate and then Tennessee director until leaving to pursue a career in medicine in 2012.