Army Corps Approves Controversial WV Coal Mine

Comment: The Change Dems are no different from the Bush's era! Still blowing up our Mountains and shipping it to China, a communist country!

08/18/2009
SustainableBusiness.com News

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a Clean Water Act permit last week for Consol Energy’s (NYSE: CNX) Peg Fork mountaintop removal coal mine in Mingo County, West Virginia. This controversial decision marks the first time during the Obama administration that the Army Corps approved a mine permit to which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had previously objected, opening the door for many new mountaintop removal coal mines in Appalachia.

The decision to allow this operation to proceed also demonstrates the Department of Interior's lack of will to enforce the clear mandates of a critical Surface Mining Act regulation, the Sierra Club said in a release.

"We are disappointed that the administration has approved a new mountaintop removal mine without making any commitment to adopt new regulations or policies that would end this destructive practice," said Ed Hopkins, Director of Sierra Club's Environmental Quality Program. "While we appreciate that the Obama administration is taking a harder look at mountaintop removal coal mining, unless that results in decisions that end the irreversible destruction of streams, the harder look isn’t going to do the job."

The Sierra Club said the permit would violate the Clean Water Act and the Surface Mining Act's buffer zone rule, which protects intermittent and perennial streams.

"The Department of Interior's continuing failure to force the mining industry to comply with the buffer zone rule is a reminder that it is business as usual at Interior," said Joe Lovett, of the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment. Lovett called for Secretary Ken Salazar to "reverse the Bush Administration's refusal to enforce the Surface Mining Act and to protect our irreplaceable streams."

Earlier this year, the EPA conducted a review of 48 applications then pending before the Army Corps for Clean Water Act permits to fill streams. At the end of its review, the EPA identified the Peg Fork mine and five other mines as projects of high concern, and instructed the Army Corps to not issue those permits.

Following the EPA’s review, the Army Corps revised Consol Energy's permit for this mountaintop removal mine and issued the permit on Friday, August 7. But the revised permit still fails to satisfy the requirements for permits issued under the Clean Water Act, according to Sierra Club.

The original permit application proposed mining over 800 acres of mountainous terrain and dumping mining waste into eight valley fills and over 3 miles of streams. The revised permit that received EPA approval still allows two valley fills immediately, with the potential for up to six additional valley fills if EPA is satisfied with the results of downstream water quality monitoring from the initial fills.

The Peg Fork permit decision comes just as the EPA begins the process of reviewing more than 80 applications for Clean Water Act permits for mountaintop removal mining under the coordinated review process announced by the Obama administration in June. Mining companies have already buried close to 2,000 miles of Appalachian streams beneath piles of toxic waste and debris. Entire communities have been permanently displaced by mines the size of Manhattan.

"The Obama administration needs to commit to ending the devastation caused to our communities by mountaintop removal. The time to make that commitment is now," said Judy Bonds of Coal River Mountain Watch. "We can not live through another generation of permits that will bury hundreds more miles of streams and blast apart our mountains."

"Science and the law are at odds with this permit decision," said Janet Keating of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. "In my opinion, the Corps' decision to issue this and other permits boils down to political pressure from coal-friendly legislators."

"A big part of the problem is that the Obama administration is still operating under the failed and broken regulations adopted during the Bush administration," said Joan Mulhern of the environmental law firm Earthjustice. "The White House and the agencies can and should immediately initiate the process for changing those regulations and restoring the environmental protections that existed prior to 2001."

"This week, newly appointed Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works) Jo-Ellen Darcy begins to oversee the Army Corps’ permitting divisions, and she has the opportunity to take bold action on mountaintop removal coal mining," said Cindy Rank of the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy. "The Corps has shown an inexplicable eagerness to permit new mountaintop removal mining, but we hope that Assistant Secretary Darcy's leadership will mean more protections for the communities, streams and mountains of Appalachia."

http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/18728

U.S. agriculture, energy secretaries to visit county Saturday

By TIM DAVIS/Star-Tribune Editor
Wednesday, July 15, 2009 9:25 AM EDT

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu will visit Pittsylvania County Saturday as part of President Obama's "Rural Tour."

Vilsack and Chu are scheduled to talk about green jobs and a new energy economy with a focus on weatherization and carbon sequestration.

The cabinet secretaries are scheduled to fly in to Danville around 10:30 a.m. and visit Piedmont BioProducts, a biodiesel pilot project at Ken Moss's Windy Acres Nursery in Gretna.

After a quick lunch, Vilsack and Chu will hold a town hall meeting at Buddy Mayhew's farm on Carter Lodge Road in Blairs.

The town hall meeting, which is open to the public, will be held from 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.

"We're expecting a large crowd," said Freddie Wydner, the county's agricultural director.

A large tent will be set up and there will be seating for around 200 people.

"If you want a seat, you'd better arrive early," Wydner said.

Info on:Name : Windy Acres Nursery Inc

DIRECTIONS
Windy Acres Nursery
1105 Cotton Patch Rd
Gretna, VA.

From Danville: Highway 29 North to Gretna. After passing Chatham exits look for a closed Shell station on the right. At the top of the hill take a left on Cotton Patch Rd (look for sign). Windy Acres Nursery is 1 mile on the left. Watch for sign to energy building.

From Lynchburg: Highway 29 South to Gretna. Pass both Gretna exits and go approximately 2 more miles, take next right Cotton Patch Rd. (look for sign) Windy Acres Nursery is 1 mile on the left. Watch for sign to energy building.

From Roanoke: 220 South to Rocky Mount. Take 2nd Rocky Mount Exit to route 40 east. Go approx. 40 minutes to Highway 29 south to Danville. Once on Hwy 29 south go approximately 2 miles and take next right onto Cotton Patch Rd. (look for sign) Windy Acres Nursery is 1 mile on the left. Watch for sign to energy building

http://www.wpcva.com/articles/2009/07/15/chatham/news/news53.txt

White House Listening Tour Slated for Pittsylvania County

Comment: Everyone Should Attend this meeting!

By Staff Reports on July 15th, 2009

The White House recently announced that President Obama has directed many members of his Cabinet to begin what it describes as a “listening tour” of rural America this summer. The tour will be in Virginia’s Blairs community on Saturday, 18 July 2009. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Agricultural Secretary Tom Vilsack will be on a mission to develop “green jobs.”

The Obama administration stated they will focus on weatherization and carbon sequestration.

A town hall meeting will be held at Buddy Mayhew’s farm (1501 Carter Lodge Road, Blairs, Virginia). The public is encouraged to arrive around 12:30 p.m. with an anticipated arrival by the Secretaries at 1:00 p.m. The Secretaries plan to take comments and questions until approximately 2:30 p.m.

Directions to Buddy Mayhew’s farm from Danville: Take Route 29 North. Turn right onto Spring Garden Road (Route 640). Go 1.7 miles, then turn left onto Carter Lodge Road (Route 825). Go 0.2 miles to Buddy’s farm.

Directions to Buddy Mayhew’s farm from Chatham: At the ‘top’ of White Oak Mountain, turn left onto Carter Lodge Road. Go 1.4 miles to Buddy’s farm.

http://www.appomattoxnews.com/2009/white-house-listening-tour-slated-for-pittsylvania-county.html

Sunday Bloggers Act: Top Ten List on Why President Obama Must Visit Appalachia and Launch War for Green Jobs

Comment: Virginia allows legal Mt. Top Removal; therefore, VA is destroying people lives for Corporate Mining! Therefore, Virginia will not have a second thought about blowing up the Piedmont, valleys or the area around interstate 95 where uranium is in abundance! The dust from uranium open pit mining will be falling on us in the Piedmont, near University of Virginia and all the main rivers in Virginia!

(Bloggers across the nation are making a joint request this Sunday: It is time for President Barack Obama and CEQ chief Nancy Sutley to make their FIRST visit to a mountaintop removal moonscape and coal slurry impoundment and bear witness to the impact of the Obama administration's regulatory strip-mining policies on affected coalfield residents. For other posts, see Deviltower's DailyKos roundup: http://devilstower.dailykos.com/ )

First, let's us praise Charleston Gazette reporter Ken Ward, whose Coal Tattoo blog has become an indispensable forum for breaking news and debate in the coalfields. You haven't already, bookmark it:
http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/

Here's the beyond-the-Beltway truth: With millions of pounds of explosives ripping across the Appalachian mountains every day, and the Office of Surface Mining (OMSRE) still operating without a director, it is almost beyond belief that President Obama, CEQ chief Nancy Sutley and EPA head Lisa Jackson have made no attempt to visit actual mining sites under their jurisdiction.

Only through a firsthand look at the economic and environmental devastation wrought from mountaintop removal's 38-year rap sheet of pollution crimes and human rights violations, will President Obama, Lisa Jackson and Nancy Sutley truly understand three stark realities:

--stricter Obama mining regulations can easily be circumvented;

--as a vanishing carbon sink, the Appalachia coalfields are ground zero in any climate change battle;

--mountaintop removal destroys any chance at a sustainable economy or new initiatives for Green Jobs.

In the summer of 1964, President Lyndon Johnson made a trip to Tom Fletcher's porch in Martin County, Kentucky, to announce the launching of the "War on Poverty."

Forty-five years later, Martin County still ranks as one of the poorest counties in the country, with over 35 percent of the population living under the poverty level, while 67 percent of the coal mining jobs have disappeared due to strip-mining and mechanization in the last two decades.

This summer, President Obama should follow in LBJ's footsteps and journey to Martin County, Kentucky, a poverty-stricken area shamelessly ravaged by strip-mining and mountaintop removal (and the site of an ignored 300-million-gallon coal slurry accident in 2000), and announce his intention to launch a "War for Green Jobs and a Phase Out of Mountaintop Removal Operations."

August 3rd, the anniversary of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act that granted federal sanctioning of mountaintop removal in 1977 in a disastrous moment of compromise by liberal Democrats, would be a fine day for a visit.

For history on SMCRA, see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/dear-mr-president-declare_b_202321.html

In the meantime, here's my top ten list on what President Obama, Sutley, Jackson and others in his administration would learn from such a fact-finding trip:

1) Stricter Obama Regulations Can Be Circumvented--Just Asked Bo Webb About Getting Your House Blasted Daily by ANFO Explosives, Shelled by Fly Rock and Rained on by Silica Dust and Heavy Metals: While Vietnam vet/businessman Bo Webb received a slight reprieve this spring on the daily blasting above his home in Clay's Branch, West Virginia, he just received notice that the violations noted by federal regulators will be circumvented by a WV state decision. Webb was told on Friday: While operators were ordered to stop blasting in Clay's Branch until they placed all the material, rocks, flyrock, boulders, downed trees and all back on their permitted area, the WV Department of Environmental Protection reviewed solution is to blast down to the next seam of coal, blasting closer to residents so they can get to all the material that is off the permitted area.

So much for stricter regulations from Washington, DC.

Webb wrote President Obama earlier this spring of this state of terror in his community: "As I write this letter, I brace myself for another round of nerve-wracking explosives being detonated above my home in the mountains of West Virginia. Outside my door, pulverized rock dust laden with diesel fuel and ammonium nitrate explosives hovers in the air, along with the residual of heavy metals that once lay dormant underground. The mountain above me, once a thriving forest, has been blasted into a pile of rock and mud rubble. Two years ago, it was covered with rich black top soil and abounded with hardwood trees, rhododendrons, ferns and flowers. The under-story thrived with herbs such as ginseng, black cohosh, yellow root, and many other medicinal plants. Black bears, deer, wild turkey, hawks, owls, and thousands of birds lived here. The mountain contained sparkling streams teeming with aquatic life and fish."

To read the entire letter, see:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/urgent-webb-letter-to-oba_b_168604.html

2) Mountaintop Removal Kills Green Jobs and Clean Energy Project, Just Ask Lorelei Scarbro, a Coal Miner's Widow in Coal River Valley, West Virginia: Facing an impending 6,000 acre mountaintop removal operation bordering her property, coal mining families like Scarbro developed a plan for an industrial wind farm that would create more energy, more tax revenues and provide more sustainable jobs than the destructive mountaintop removal operations on Coal River Mountain, and save their historic communities. See: www.coalriverwind.org

3) Coal Companies Receive A Lot of Welfare, and Martin County, Kentucky, Home of the War on Poverty, Lost 67 Percent of Its Coal Mining Jobs Due to Stripped Down Mountaintop Removal Operations: For a chart on the relationship between mountaintop removal, lost jobs and poverty in Martin County, see: http://www.kftc.org/our-work/canary-project/campaigns/mtr/county-profiles

Earlier this week, a new study found that the Kentucky coal industry is a major recipient of WELFARE: Coal companies in Kentucky take $115 million more from Kentucky's state government annually in services and programs than they contribute in tax revenues.

4) Like Coalfield Parents, President Obama Wouldn't Want to Send His Daughters to the Marsh Fork Elementary School Either: Unlike the Sidwell Friends School in Washington, DC, children at Marsh Fork school in Sundial, West Virginia, must play in toxic coal dust from a nearby coal silo, as 2.8 billion gallons of coal sludge held back by a precarious earthen dam stare down daily at the playground, as mountaintop removal explosions take place nearby.

5) Union-Busting Out-of-State Coal Companies Have Polarized the Coalfields and Inflamed Violence: With less than 1,000 United Mine workers employed at mountaintop removal sites in West Virginia, the truth is that most mountaintop removal operators are owned and operated by union-busting outside corporations like Massey Energy, a Richmond, VA company that celebrated record profits in 2008, paid millions in penalties for criminal and civil violations, and then slashed its union-busted workforce this spring.

Infamous Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship revels in mountaintop removal conflict and union-busting--and yet, his ruthless operations receive tacit support from the Obama administration.

Here's a clip of a violent Massey supporter attack on this week's nonviolent march with Goldman Prize Winner Judy Bonds from Marsh Fork Elementary School this week:

6) Flooding from Mountaintop Removal Operations Still Rolls Down Like Injustice: Living under a mountaintop removal operation, Goldman Prize winner Maria Gunnoe, in Boone County, West Virginia, has seen seven floods sweep by her home, where the natural mountain valleys and waterways have been destroyed and clear cutting and blasting have led to massive erosion. Here's a clip from one of the floods:

7) Mountaintop Removal Stripmines Black History Month and Appalachian Heritage: Just as our nation has quietly overlooked the Appalachian coal mining origins of Black History Month godfather Carter Woodson, whose coal mining tenure in Raleigh County, West Virginia inspired his work as a historian and moved him to launch Negro History Week in the 1920s, the 38-year nightmare of mountaintop removal mining and its origins of betrayal in the same county of Woodson's mining experience have led to the destruction of the rich Appalachian heritage. See:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/stripmining-black-history_b_83918.html

8) Mountaintop Removal Operators Are NOT Coal Miners, But Mostly Heavy Equipment Operators (Bulldozer and Truck Drivers) Who Could Easily Be Used on Infrastructure Projects, Waterworks, Highway Projects, Genuine Reclamation and Reforestation Projects, and a Lot of Green Jobs Initiatives and Manufacturing Plants (Building Wind Turbines, Solar Panels).

In fact, every mountaintop removal operator job has taken away 2-3 jobs from underground coal miners.

9) President Obama Might Share a Beer But Not a Glass of Water with the Residents of Prenter, West Virginia: In a community stricken by coal sludge contamination of their wells and watersheds, illnesses including gallbladder disease abound--and yet, despite the overwhelming evidence of coal company negligence, American citizens can still NOT drink their tap or well water and must pay to truck in bottled water for the next two years until a new water system is set up. See:
http://www.prenterwaterfund.org/about

10) And When President Obama Returns to DC, Mountaintop Removal Will Come With Him: The joy of President Obama's air-conditioner at the White House and Oval Office requires the devastation of Appalachian mountains and historic communities, where coal stripmined from mountaintop removal sites in Appalachia are trained into the Potomac River power plant, which generates the electricity for Washington, DC.

Bottom line: It is time for the President and his CEQ and EPA administrators to come up to the mountain.

For more information, see: ilovemountains.org

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-biggers/sunday-bloggers-act-top-t_b_221976.html

Obama Looks To End Expedited Mining Reviews

Comment: If you believe the story, you must believe in the Easter Bunny! The Administration of Change is the same old, same old, blow up the mountains for coal, blow up the Grand Canyon for Uranium!

Obama Administration Wants To Eliminate Speedy Reviews For Mountaintop Mining
WASHINGTON, Jun. 11, 2009

(AP) The Obama administration wants tougher environmental reviews for coal companies that mine the Appalachians by blasting off mountaintops and discarding the rubble in stream valleys.

The administration plans to announce Thursday a proposal to eliminate the expedited reviews that have made it easier for mining companies to get approval for mountaintop mining.

The proposal is part of an agreement between three federal agencies that will lead to a series of changes to boost federal oversight and environmental screening of the practice.

Nancy Sutley, head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in an interview with The Associated Press that the Interior Department, Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers will establish clear standards that will ensure the environment, economy and health of Appalachia are adequately protected.

Mining waste dumped into waterways can diminish water quality for fish and other aquatic organisms, and taint sources of drinking water.

"We need to give the right amount of scrutiny to these activities," Sutley said.

President Barack Obama, while campaigning for the White House, expressed concern about the mountaintop mining, saying at one point that it was tearing up the Appalachian Mountains.

His administration has already cast a more critical eye on the process than its predecessor, which was accused of granting permits with little scrutiny. In March, the EPA announced it would more take a closer look at about 150 mountaintop mining permits pending before the Army Corps of Engineers to ensure they will not harm streams and wetlands.

The agency objected to some projects but has said dozens would likely proceed.

Then in April, the Interior Department asked a federal judge to vacate a Bush rule that makes it easier to dump mining waste near waterways.

On Thursday, the Obama administration will take another step by proposing to eliminate a short cut in place since 1982 that allows mining companies proposing similar projects to get a general permit under the Clean Water Act, rather than being evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

About 30 percent of mountaintop removal projects are permitted under the general permit to discharge waste into streams, according to administration officials.

Mountaintop mines in West Virginia, Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee produce nearly 130 million tons of coal each year, or about 14 percent of the coal that produces electricity. It also employs about 14,000 people with high-paying jobs.

The agreement to be announced Thursday will address those concerns, too, officials said, by having federal agencies work together to diversify and strengthen the regional economy, including the development of clean energy jobs.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/11/ap/politics/main5080134.shtml