Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming
Without a doubt coal is dirty and dangerous. Consider that the nation's power plants spew out 130 million tons of coal combustion waste every year. Much of this so-called coal ash, which is what's left at the bottom of the smokestacks after coal gets burned...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Kudos to the USA Today for coming out strong in its opposition to the worst of the worst coal mining: mountaintop removal. Today's excellent, hold-no-punches editorial declares "it's time to protect forests, streams from environmental degradation." It kicks off this way: Buried...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Let me get this straight. President Obama, touting his administration's support for clean energy, visited Florida yesterday to tour the DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center, with its solar panels sprawling across 180 acres that can generate power for 3,000 homes. Yet on Coal River...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Since many of our elected leaders seem to be worried about costs, they should consider this: fossil fuels cost the United States about $120 billion a year, according to a study by the National Academy of Sciences. This cost is measured primarily by thousands...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
Now that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has made it clear that mountaintop removal coal mining poses a severe threat to the environment -- most notably to water quality -- in Appalachia, the fate of this abominable practice appears to rest...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming
Are you drinking water contaminated by coal pollution? Apparently, that's what folks living in the shadows of the South Carolina Electric & Gas coal plant fear. A chilling story published in the Charleston Post & Courier tells how local residents "have wondered for years about...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming , U.S. Law and Policy
Kudos to Congressman Ed Markey (D-MA) for bird-dogging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on the need to regulate pollution from coal-fired power plants. Yesterday, Rep. Markey sent a letter to EPA requesting information on the agency's findings related to the...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
"You can't put a mountain back." -- Judy Bonds Across the Appalachians, companies are blowing entire mountaintops to smithereens to get at the thin coal seams below. The communities of the region are paying the cost in their health, their...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming
On the heels of last month's jaw-dropping New York Times expose of widespread water pollution in the U.S., the newspaper just published this follow-up story focusing on one of the culprits: pollution from coal-fired power plants. The NYT story highlights...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Right now the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is holding public hearings in six Appalachian states on mountaintop removal coal mining. This controversial practice is at long last under intense scrutiny by the Obama administration, with the U.S. Environmental...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming
Last night "60 Minutes" aired an in-depth story on the problems with coal ash, a byproduct of the burning of coal at power plants. Leslie Stahl focused on last year's nightmare before Christmas, when an impoundment pond containing 50-year's worth of coal ash...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
The coalfields of eastern Kentucky are ground zero for mountaintop removal coal mining. Explosives rock the peaks and echo through the hollows. Twenty-story draglines scrape out enough dirt to fill several dump trucks with every scoop. Earth-movers literally move the...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Common-sense tells us that blowing up a mountain and dumping the waste into valley streams is bad for water quality. But that logic has yet to thwart mountaintop removal coal mining. So I take it as a positive sign that the U.S. Environmental...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment
This morning I was sipping a bottled water and perusing my blackberry in a hospital waiting room while my son awaited treatment for a broken elbow. I came upon an email forwarded by a colleague, which provided a link to a jaw-dropping story...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming
Information obtained from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reveals the existence of nearly twice as many toxic coal ash dumps across the country as the agency previously indicated to the public. The results of NRDC's recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request -- filed jointly with Sierra...
