Posts Tagged ‘EPA’
The EPA’s New Carbon Rule, Getting Serious About Climate Change
So we’re a little late to the punch on this one. Let’s take a moment to catch up. Last Tuesday, March 27, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released the first-ever rules regulating carbon pollution from power plants. For those who didn’t already know this news, I should also mention this is not an April Fool’s…
Read MoreAsheville’s Call to Action: The Beginning of the End for Toxic Coal Ash
By Patrick Cavanaugh, 2012 Red, White and Water intern It’s hard to miss the Asheville coal-fired power plant as you drive into Lake Julian Park in Arden, N.C. The smokestacks and discolored water surrounding the plant scream of environmental abuse and disfigurement. Our mission was the hidden abuses this plant perpetrates on nearby residents that…
Read MoreClose Calls as Congress Defeats Rollbacks to EPA Boiler Rule and Speed-up of Keystone XL Pipeline
Get ready, because a hostile hive of lobbyists echoing industry cries that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is no more than big government, job-killing, mean, green machine may have just been shaken up again. On Thurs., March 8, Congress narrowly defeated an amendment to a transportation funding bill authored by Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) that…
Read MoreYesterday and Today: Defending the Clean Water Act
By Jamie Goodman Forty years ago, it took a flaming river to spur our nation to protect its waterways. The river that played a prominent role in the creation of the Clean Water Act and the Environmental Protection Agency is thought to have erupted in flames on thirteen separate occasions in a one-hundred-year period, ending…
Read MoreEPA Buffaloed Over Surface Mine
A letter sent by the EPA to WVDEP in January expresses the agency’s concerns about CONSOL Energy’s 2,308-acre Buffalo Mountain surface mine. The EPA has suggested ways to reduce the negative impacts on the environment and water quality that the surface mine, one of Appalachia’s largest, will inevitably have. Stretching from Belo to Williamson in…
Read MoreEPA Issues First-Ever National Mercury and Air Toxic Standards
In December 2011, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued the Mercury and Air Toxic Standards, the first-ever national standards to protect families from mercury and toxic air pollutants emitted by power plants. Pollutants from coal-fired power plants include arsenic, acid gas, nickel, selenium and cyanide. The standards will cut these emissions with proven pollution controls…
Read MoreWright Bros, Georgia DOT Fined $1.5 Million for Clean Water Violations
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Justice will require Wright Brothers Construction Co. and the Georgia Department of Transportation to pay $1.5 million in fines for violations of the Clean Water Act between 2004 and 2007. One of the largest fines ever assesed under the CWA, the complaint states that Wright…
Read MoreBad Bill of the Week
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has just introduced a bill that has the sole purpose of making it easier for coal companies to pollute water. S.2122, the “Defense of Environment and Property Act” neither defends the environment nor private property. While the Senator makes the argument that the legislation protects the right of “landowners to do…
Read MoreDelayed Coal Ash Regulations Put Public Health at Risk
Appalachian Voices issued the following press release to news outlets in North Carolina. A similar version was released nationally by the eleven environmental and public health groups involved in this litigation. Delayed Coal Ash Regulations Put Public Health at Risk Groups head to court to force issuance of important national safeguards Washington, D.C. – Environmental…
Read MoreDelayed Coal Ash Regulations Put Public Health at Risk
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTAINS TARGETED NORTH CAROLINA INFORMATION Contact: Sandra Diaz, Appalachian Voices, (828) 262-1500; sandra@appvoices.org Hartwell Carson, French Broad Riverkeeper, (828) 817-5358; hartwell@wnca.org Delayed Coal Ash Regulations Put Public Health at Risk Groups head to court to force issuance of important national safeguards Washington, D.C. – Environmental and public health groups announced their intent…
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