Front Porch Blog
Updates from Appalachia
The Carbon / Climate Challenge
In a few weeks, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is set to unveil the nation’s first-ever proposal to limit planet-warming carbon pollution from the nation’s existing power plants — the single largest contributor to America’s carbon footprint. This is a critical opportunity to move the needle away from dirty fossil fuels and the destruction they wreak — including mountaintop removal and poisoned water and air — and toward cleaner, more sustainable ways to power our lives.
North Carolinians Stand Together for Coal Ash Cleanup
This month residents and clean water advocates across North Carolina have stood together to demand that Duke Energy clean up its coal ash pollution. On May 1, Appalachian Voices joined hundreds to rally outside Duke’s annual shareholder meeting and a little more than a week later we helped host a community paddle and picnic day on Belews Lake, where the the largest and dirtiest coal plant in North Carolina is located.
A Victory in the Battle to Protect Blair Mountain
An order from the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection will put a section of a mountaintop removal permit near historic Blair Mountain off limits to mining until at least 2018, when the permit comes up for renewal. During a site visit in March, Friends of Blair Mountain documented “significant areas of the battlefield” that were destroyed through logging and construction methods.
The Power of Energy Efficiency — Building a Stronger Economy for Appalachia (Part 2)
The small businesses, churches and schools you’re likely to find in a typical Appalachian town are pillars of their communities. But they’re not sources of significant employment. For most of rural Appalachia, poverty, high unemployment and the lack of economic diversity are persistent problems that have yet to be addressed in any comprehensive, effective manner.
Look out Cleveland: Shareholders, activists converge on Dominion annual shareholder meeting
Activists in Ohio and shareholders from throughout Dominion Virginia Power’s service area including Virginia converged on Cleveland on Wednesday, to greet the company’s CEO, Thomas Farrell, board and shareholders as they gathered for Dominion Resources’ annual meeting.
