Posts Tagged ‘Mountaintop Removal’
SELC Releases Top Ten Endangered Places List, Shows Threats in Southeast
The Southern Environmental Law Center recently released its fourth-annual Top 10 Endangered Places list for 2012, highlighting the ecologically and culturally rich areas throughout the Southeast that are threatened by development, water issues and the environmental impacts of mountaintop removal and hydraulic fracturing. Southeastern states bordering Appalachia, North Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee, are each featured…
Read MorePutting the Human Perspective into Mountaintop Removal
By Brian Sewell For every movement, there is a message. This message can take many forms, but often the most moving is the creation of art to inform. Art helps people see problems anew, even those who see them everyday. The campaign to end mountaintop removal is no different. At the annual meeting of Kentuckians…
Read MorePaul Corbit Brown: Truth Before Profit
By Jamie Goodman Paul Corbit Brown’s life has come full circle – thanks to the lens on his camera. He was born into a coal miner’s family in Kilsyth, W.Va. For generations, every male in his family had become coal miners, but a chance encounter when he was 12 years old ultimately resulted in a…
Read MoreAppalachian Coal Mining Jobs Reach 14-year High
Increase Comes Despite Arguments that Regulations Kill Jobs Some congressional representatives claim that federal oversight of mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia threatens domestic coal production and the regions coal mining jobs, but new government data indicates the opposite is true. Data released by the Mine Safety and Health Administration show that the number of jobs…
Read MoreRally to Save Ison Rock
Hundreds of citizens gathered at U.S. Environmental Protection Agency headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 16 to call on the EPA and White House to block a proposed mountaintop removal permit that would destroy Ison Rock Ridge in Wise County, Va. More than 2,000 residents living in the five communities that surround the mountain would…
Read MoreGroups Challenge Public’s Exclusion From Secret Negotiations
An agreement negotiated in secret between the Beshear administration and a major polluter in eastern Kentucky does little to protect the public or prevent future violations, claimed several groups representing Kentucky citizens who use water polluted by the company’s coal mining operations.
The citizens’ groups filed a petition in Franklin Circuit Court on Thursday asking that the agreement between Nally & Hamilton Enterprises and the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet be vacated on the grounds that there is “no factual evidence in the record, much less substantial evidence, [that] supports a finding that the Agreed Order is a fair resolution of Nally’s thousands of [Clean Water Act] violations, or that it will be an effective deterrent of future violations.”
Read MoreOther Tidbits
Rallying for Ison Rock Ridge In southwestern Virginia, a mountain known as Ison Rock Ridge — along with several headwater streams — is slated for destruction to access the coal seams inside it. During October, Appalachian Voices, the Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards and the Wise Energy for Virginia Coalition are hosting three major rallies to…
Read MoreHigher Fines for Big Coal in Kentucky Clean Water Act Case
By Erin Savage The Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet recently reached a settlement of $507,000, with Nally & Hamilton Enterprises, Inc., a mountaintop removal coal mining company in eastern Kentucky. The fine tops previous record-setting fines issued in Appalachian Voices’ on-going case against Frasure Creek and ICG coal companies, $310,000 and $350,000, respectively. Appalachian Voices,…
Read MoreCongressional Hearing on Stream Buffer Zone Neglects Residents
By Jamie Goodman On Sept. 26, a Congressional hearing took place in Charleston, W.Va. to discuss proposed revisions to the controversial stream buffer zone rule designed to further protect waterways in Appalachia. Conducted by Representatives Doug Lamborn (R-CO) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) from the Subcommitte on Energy and Mineral Resources in Charleston, W.Va., the…
Read MoreCoal River Mountain – The Line in the Sand for Mountaintop Removal?
Story and photos by Jamie Goodman For those who support alternative energy and oppose mountaintop removal, a line has been drawn in the proverbial sand. That line is at Coal River Mountain, West Virginia. Bulldozers have continued to clear trees and topsoil from Coal River Mountain, a peak that could potentially provide some of the…
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