Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Next week in Nashville will be a doozy for Music City, U.S.A. First, there's NRDC mega Music Saves Mountains concert to help build national momentum to end mountaintop removal coal mining. The following night -- May 20th -- NRDC also will be...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
I caught last night's CNN interview with media mogul Ted Turner, Jr. on the topic of energy. He praised the climate bill introduced yesterday by Sens. Kerry and Lieberman and said transitioning to a clean energy economy is a "political no-brainer" that will create green...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Justin Townes Earle was born to be a music star. The son of legendary folk singer Steve Earle, and named for celebrated songwriter Townes Van Zandt, the young Earle is an award-winning singer-songwriter in his own right. Born and bred in Nashville,...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
I’ve received several calls and emails over the past week from folks concerned about the flood disaster in Nashville and its impact on NRDC's Music Saves Mountains concert at the Ryman on May 19th. First of all, our thoughts are with...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Moving Beyond Oil , Reviving the World's Oceans , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
This just in...The U.S. Department of Interior has indefinitely suspended plans for an oil and gas lease sale off the Virginia coastline! Two days ago I blogged on this: As a native Virginian who grew up surfing Virginia Beach and vacationing...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) is an iconic legislator who has served in the Senate since 1959. He is more than a politician from West Virginia; he is the undisputed symbol of power and authority in the state. When Sen....
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Ever since the Kingston coal ash catastrophe in Tennessee in December 2008, we've been waiting for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to fulfill its promise to take action to deal with the ticking time bombs of hundreds of unlined landfills...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Environmental Justice , Health and the Environment , Moving Beyond Oil , Reviving the World's Oceans , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Talk about having your head stuck in the oil-soaked sand. In the wake of the Gulf Coast oil spill, Sarah Palin recently reiterated her commitment to the slogan 'drill here, drill now', writing on her Facebook page: "All responsible energy development...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
"I worked in the coal mines for 22 years and that’s how I made my living and supported my family. I have never seen an outfit treat a community the way TECO Coal has done us...They need to quit doing...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
One of the biggest concerns about mountaintop removal coal mining has to do with its impacts on water. That's understandable, of course, because this extreme strip mining involves dumping tons of blasted rubble, dirt and contaminated waste over the side...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) is the proud co-sponsor of a bi-partisan bill in Congress that would effectively end mountaintop removal coal mining. (You can help by contacting your senators and urging them to support S. 696 The Appalachia Restoration Act.) ...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming , The Media and the Environment
The fight to ban mountaintop removal in Tennessee via state legislation may have stalled, but momentum against this reckless coal mining method continues to build. The Tennessean weighs in with a hard-hitting editorial calling for an end to this "unsustainable" mining...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
Our hearts and prayers continue to go out to the miners and their families in the disaster in West Virginia. We particularly share the pain of the families of the miners who remain missing days after the massive explosion. I share the...
Posted by Rob Perks in Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
A few months ago I had the distinct pleasure of attending an event in Nashville, hosted by country music legend Emmylou Harris, to debut one of NRDC’s key initiatives to end mountaintop removal coal mining. MusicSavesMountains.org is a way for...
Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places , Solving Global Warming
This is NOT an April Fool's joke: At long last, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency appears to be restoring science to its rightful place in protecting Appalachian communities from the world's worst coal mining. So here's what happened. Today EPA announced a set of...
