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 culture and their natural heritage. Big coal companies should not be allowed to turn our nations' oldest mountains into molehills, and NRDC is working with local allies to halt this damaging practice.
Posted January 10, 2012 by Melissa Waage in Health and the Environment, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
Will this be the year that Tennessee becomes the first state to ban mountaintop removal mining? Leaders in the state legislature are once again pressing forward with the Scenic Vistas Protection Act, a bill to end mountaintop removal in the state. And they...continued→
Posted December 13, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Health and the Environment
The Charleston Gazette highlights a new study confirming the long-term water quality impacts of mountaintop removal mining. In the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science (PNAS) this week, a team of Duke University researchers found that contamination from MTR mines is cumulative, and...continued→
Posted December 1, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Health and the Environment
Earlier this year Music Saves Mountains member band 2/3 Goat started their grassroots fundraising campaign to produce a new video for their mountaintop removal themed song "Stream of Conscience." And they did it! Thanks to everyone's donations, they've just debuted...continued→
Posted November 22, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment
Great news for Music Saves Mountains member band, 2/3 Goat! The New-York-based act uses "metrobilly" music as a platform to spread the word about mountaintop removal and why it must be stopped. Earlier this year, the group successfully funded a new video on...continued→
Posted November 15, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment
This past weekend, Earl Ray Tomblin was inaugurated as Governor of West Virginia.* and he wasn’t bashful about what he feels he’s been put in office to do: buck federal protections for public health and the environment, for the benefit...continued→
Posted November 7, 2011 by John H. Adams in Moving Beyond Oil, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
I just had one of the most energizing days of my life. I spent Sunday standing with as many as 15,000 people in an enormous circle around the White House. All of us came to tell President Obama to reject...continued→
Posted September 27, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment
Yesterday a House Natural Resources subcommittee tried its very hardest not to hear West Virginians' concerns about the destruction and heartbreak of mountaintop removal in their communities. Now the subcommittee leadership is trying to pretend these people don't even exist. As I blogged previously, the Charleston,...continued→
Posted September 25, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment
Will there be any voice at all for health and the environment at the latest dog-and-pony-show House hearing on mountaintop removal regulation? That’s what community organizers in West Virginia are asking as a House Natural Resources Committee panel gears up...continued→
Posted September 22, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Curbing Pollution, Health and the Environment
We know that mountaintop removal kills mining jobs. But naturally that didn’t stop the House Government Reform Committee and its anti-regulation chair, Darrell Issa, from making the claim in a recent report that the EPA's lawful and appropriate regulation of mining...continued→
Posted August 16, 2011 by Melissa Waage in Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment
Last week a CNN poll found that a 57% majority of Americans oppose mountaintop removal mining. But what about people living where coal is king? One might assume that the numbers would be different in places most directly affected, economically and...continued→
