west virginia

Fri, 2013-01-18 14:52Laurel Whitney
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Thousands of Miners' Benefits In Jeopardy As Patriot Coal Claims Bankruptcy

On January 29, Patriot Coal Co. will begin Chapter 11 bankruptcy hearings in St. Louis, MO claiming that it's become a "victim of the markets" and can no longer pay its debts. These "debts" include millions of dollars of retiree health benefits. If the company goes under, the benefits may go along with it.

That's why the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) is suing. Filed back in October, the lawsuit cites the Employee Retirement and Income Securities Act, which states that coal companies must provide health insurance for retired miners.

However, the UMWA isn't suing Patriot Coal.

Most of the 10,000 workers in the class action lawsuit have never actually worked for Patriot. They actually put in their time (many with upwards of 30 years of service) with Peabody Energy Corp. and Arch Coal Inc. The UMWA contends that Peabody and Arch sold off the benefits to a company that was doomed to fail, therefore getting rid of the debt and leaving thousands without health insurance.

Read more: Thousands of Miners' Benefits In Jeopardy As Patriot Coal Claims Bankruptcy
Fri, 2012-11-23 13:58Steve Horn
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Fracking Your Future: Campus Drilling Extends Far Beyond Pennsylvania

The oil and gas industry plans to perform hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") on college campuses in Pennsylvania, just as it currently does in close proximity to K-12 schools nationwide. 

But as NPR demonstrated in a recent report, that's just the tip of the iceberg.

"More than a dozen schools in states as varied as Texas, Montana, Ohio and West Virginia are already tapping natural resources on college campuses," the report explains. "The University of Southern Indiana recently started pumping oil."

Like Pennsylvania - which has seen higher education budget cuts totaling over $460 million since Republican Gov. Tom Corbett took office in 2010 - nearly all of these states have faced massive cuts in their most recent budgets. 

Texas, led by Republican Gov. Rick Perry, saw a $1.7 billion funding cut in its most recent budget cycle. Indiana, led by Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels, was hit with $150 million in higher education cuts in its most recent budget.

Montana, led by Democratic Governor Brian Schweitzer, was handed $14.6 million in higher education cuts in the most recent budget. And West Virginia, led by Democratic Governor Earl Ray Tomblin, saw $34 million evaporate from its higher education war chest in its most recent budget cycle.

Read more: Fracking Your Future: Campus Drilling Extends Far Beyond Pennsylvania
Fri, 2012-06-01 15:46Steve Horn
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Massey WV Coal Battle Take Two: Erie, CO Citizens Fight Fracking

Erie, CO meet Naoma, WV. Though seemingly different battles over different ecologically hazardous extractive processes -- hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") for unconventional gas versus mountaintop removal for coal -- the two battles are one in the same and direct parallels of one another. 

On June 2, a coalition of activist organizations led by Erie Rising and joined by the likes of the Sierra Club, the Mark Ruffalo-lead Water Defense, the Angela Monti Fox-lead Mothers Project (mother of "Gasland" Producer and Director, Josh Fox), Food and Water Watch (FWW), among others, will take to Erie, CO to say "leave and leave now" to EnCana Corporation.

EnCana has big plans to drill baby drill in Erie.

It "plans to frack for natural gas near three local schools and a childcare center," according to a press release disseminated by FWW. "On June 2, the event in Erie will give voice to those immediately affected by fracking there, and to all Americans marred by the process, becoming ground zero for the national movement to expose the dangers associated with fracking."

The action is a simple one: a "rally and vigil to protest gas industry giant Encana’s plans to frack for natural gas near Red Hawk Elementary, Erie Elementary, Erie Middle School and Exploring Minds Childcare Center and transport toxic fracking by-products on roads that come within feet of these and other community schools," reads the FWW press release.

Maria Gunnoe describes Marsh Fork Elementary

Like the battle in Erie of today, the battle in Naoma involved, as Schabacker put it in his interview, "mothers' standing up to protect their children in their community." Ted Nace, Director of Coalswarm, a project on the Center for Media and Democracy's Sourcewatch project and author of the book Climate Hope: On the Front Lines of the Fight Against Coal, told DeSmogBlog in an interview that it is these types of battles that win the hearts and minds of regular everyday people.

"Movements need rallying points and a movement needs to have cases of high visibility local impact," said Nace.

"Those people who think about building movements should keep their eyes open to such cases. People at the local level are also looking to get visibility for their community. And I do think one of the big dimensions of environmental activism is finding stories that resonate for people. It's a lot easier for people to comprehend a story that involves other peoples' families than it is to understand a story about some unpronouncable chemical."

Eventually, after a long, hard grassroots fight, often involving civil disobedience, Massey Energy (with financial help from the Annenberg Foundation) was pressured into building a new school for the community away from the Upper Big Branch Mine. 

Time will tell whether Erie sees similar success. The parallel, at the very least, is an interesting one. 

Image credit: Shutterstock | Cindi Wilson

Read more: Massey WV Coal Battle Take Two: Erie, CO Citizens Fight Fracking
Fri, 2012-04-27 12:55Farron Cousins
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Coal Ash Sites Posing Increasing Dangers To Water Supplies, Public Health

The Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) has once again put together a fantastic report regarding water contamination near coal ash disposal sites.

Last year, the EIP released several reports showing that drinking water near coal ash disposal sites in states across America contained dangerous levels of heavy metals and other toxins, including arsenic. In total, last year’s report revealed 53 sites in the United States where coal ash had polluted drinking water supplies.

The new report has identified a total of 116 coal ash sites in America that are leaching deadly toxins into the environment.

The new EIP report resulted from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the EPA, which revealed that 49 different coal-fired power plants acknowledged that their own testing showed that groundwater pollution around their disposal sites far exceeded the federally acceptable levels. Among the chemicals reported to exceed federal standards at the coal-fired plants’ disposal sites are:
 

Read more: Coal Ash Sites Posing Increasing Dangers To Water Supplies, Public Health
Sat, 2012-04-07 11:57Laurel Whitney
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Spruce Mine Mountaintop Removal Coal Permit Restored

In late March, a federal court ruled to open the Spruce No. 1 mine in Logan County, WV, to mountaintop removal coal mining. The EPA had originally vetoed the permit back in January of 2011, explaining that the destructive practices of mountaintop removal would endanger communities' health and access to clean water.

The permit authorizes the largest single mountaintop removal site in West Virginia's history.

Federal Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that the EPA overreached when it tried to revoke the permit using the laws of the Clean Water Act. Berman declared,

“It posits a scenario involving the automatic self-destruction of a written permit issued by an entirely separate federal agency after years of study and consideration. Not only is this nonrevocation-revocation logistically complicated, but the possibility that it could happen would leave permittees in the untenable position of being unable to rely upon the sole statutory touchstone for measuring their Clean Water Act compliance: the permit."

Read more: Spruce Mine Mountaintop Removal Coal Permit Restored
Wed, 2011-07-13 19:02Carol Linnitt
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Fracking Wastes Devastate Research Forest in Virginia

Wastewater from hydraulic fracturing (fracking) operations poses a serious threat to national forests, according to a researcher from the U.S. Forest Service. Mary Beth Adams conducted a two year study of soil and vegetation health in West Virginia after more than 75,000 gallons of fracking wastewater were applied to a portion of forest set aside for research. 

The study, appearing in the July-August issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Environmental Quality, tracks the effects of fracking wastewater on a quarter-acre section of the Fernow Experimental Forest in the Monongahela National Forest. Adams monitored the effects of the land application over a two-year period.

Within two days, the contaminated fluids had killed all ground level plant life and within 10 days began to brown the foliage of trees. Within two years all of the trees showed signs of damage and more than half of the 150 trees in the test area were dead. The study notes a dramatic 50-fold increase of sodium and chloride in surface soil after the application, but, because the chemical composition of fracking wastes is protected as proprietary information, the full contamination effects could not be studied.

Read more: Fracking Wastes Devastate Research Forest in Virginia
Sat, 2011-06-18 10:51Laurel Whitney
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Stories From The March On Blair Mountain - Part 2 The Rally

Continued from Part 1, The March.

By the end of the week, over 300 people had joined the march, some having walked the full 50 miles. The campsite the rally was held at was overlooked by Blair Mountain itself, a large looming reminder of what we were fighting for. As Saturday rolled in, a thousand supporters in total had joined the marchers to walk up the last two miles to the summit, to reclaim the historical landmark.

The day started off with a stack of speakers, musicians, and community members. The crowd heard personal accounts from Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who spoke out against mountaintop removal, describing the destruction of mountains, pollution of local waterways, and exploitation of the communities surrounded by mountaintop removal mines. He spoke of how corporate greed reigns and how companies get away with crimes everyday that normal people would be thrown in jail for.

“If you came to the Hudson River, and you tried to fill 25 feet of a Hudson River tributary, we would put you in jail…If you tried to blow up a mountain in the Berkshires, or the Catskills, or the Adirondacks…you would go to jail. It all started here on Blair Mountain, this is the Gettysburg of the union movement in our country.”

Read more: Stories From The March On Blair Mountain - Part 2 The Rally
Wed, 2011-04-27 11:15Mike Casey
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National Coal Expert: “Mining is a Loser” in Practically Every Way

Originally posted at The Great Energy Challenge blog

Anytime coal’s cost to America is discussed, the coal industry reflexively talks about what an economic lifeline it is for the states in which it operates. Headwaters Economics, a Bozeman-based think tank focusing on natural resource issues, has a solid new study that’s getting national attention for undercutting those claims. For instance, the Headwaters study finds that “[f]ossil fuel production has not insulated energy-producing states from fiscal crisis,” that “[f]ossil fuel extraction has a limited influence at the state level on economic indicators such as GDP by state, personal income, and employment,” and that “[t]he volatility of fossil fuel markets poses obstacles to the stability and long-term security of economic growth in energy-producing regions.”

This is a problem for the coal industry, which spends heavily to construct a fantasy world in which it’s a “clean” industry to which we should feel grateful, a vital supplier of our power, and an economic lifeline to host communities.

But in the real world, coal’s case is even weaker than the Headwaters study shows. The work of Professor Michael Hendryx of West Virginia University goes even further. His work has looked at the costs of coal mining to the Appalachian communities that host it.

Read more: National Coal Expert: “Mining is a Loser” in Practically Every Way
Tue, 2011-01-18 15:43TJ Scolnick
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West Virginia Politicians Vow To Fight Dirty On Coal, While EPA Enforces Laws To Protect Appalachian Residents

Dirty coal and climate denial are hot topics in West Virginia right now.  Last week, acting Governor Earl Ray Tomblin (D-WV) delivered West Virginia’s State of the State address where he gave a spirited defence of “carbon friendly” coal.  Then the very next day the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) stole the spotlight by vetoing what would have been the largest mountaintop removal project in the state.

Tomblin, who replaces former Governor and newly minted Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV), emphasized his support for the expanded use of coal as a vital part of the nation’s energy mix.  He also vowed to aggressively pursue West Virginia’s lawsuit against EPA until a more “sensible” approach can be found to regulate coal’s global warming emissions.

Governor Tomblin’s comments do not break new ground and will tie West Virginia to coal despite the fact that the industry negatively impacts the state’s economy.  His counterparts Senators Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and the aforementioned Joe Manchin are already well known for frequently overlooking the negative impacts of coal.

Read more: West Virginia Politicians Vow To Fight Dirty On Coal, While EPA Enforces Laws To Protect Appalachian Residents
Mon, 2010-12-06 17:22Brendan DeMelle
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Want To Be The Next CEO of Massey Energy As Don Blankenship Retires?

Sierra Club pranksters have posted on Craig's List an all-too-honest job description for anyone hoping to apply for the CEO job at Massey Energy to replace retiring CEO Don Blankenship.  Think you're qualified to fill the shoes of one of the worst polluters in America? 

Here is the Craig's List job description:

Massey Energy Seeks CEO

Date: 2010-12-06, 5:33PM EST
Reply to: job-a32nw-2098801382@craigslist.org [Errors when replying to ads?]


Massey Energy seeks a new Chief Executive Officer to carry on its important work destroying the environment and jeopardizing the health and safety of its employees. This position will oversee all Massey Energy operations (but don't worry - stringent or really any oversight is not a corporate priority).

 

Key responsibilities:

-Ducking responsibility for grave accidents and enthusiastically (and with a straight face) shifting the blame to government agencies created to prevent such incidents.

-Denying climate change, hating the environment and hating anyone who might enjoy the environment.

-Trading campaign cash for congressional favor.

-Threatening members of the media.

-Personally persuading workers to abandon union organizing.

 

Read more: Want To Be The Next CEO of Massey Energy As Don Blankenship Retires?

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