Gazette photos by Lawrence Pierce
Here’s a link to my Gazette story on today’s mountaintop removal demonstrations here in Charleston.
The Associated Press had two reporters at the event, and we’ve posted their story on our Web site as well. They included this interesting tidbit:
Before taking the stage, Kennedy waded into the crowd of shouting miners and spent a half-hour debating Massey Vice President of Surface Operations Mike Snelling and others.
“He’s very passionate about what he was doing and I have to give him enough credit for walking through a crowd of a lot of people he would consider adversaries,” Snelling said. “He just keeps talking about the environment and the concern for the environment and the mountains of Appalachia, and what we tried to tell him is that we are just as concerned about the mountains – or more than he is, for the fact that we live here.”
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Americans understand hollowing out mountains for the energy they contain. Americans accept digging great holes in the Powder River Basin and filling them back up. But Americans don’t accept tearing down mountain, after mountain, after mountain for less than ten per cent of the nation’s coal.
The miners outnumbered the environmentalists… I loved it
How much were you paid to be there Brandon? And did you get there in a company truck like the rest of the Massey gang?
The numbers were actually comparable, but what Brandon and the gang don’t seem to understand is that this is a substance issue. Folks across WV and the USofA don’t care that there were 200 Friends of Mountains and 213 Coal Industry Employees – especially when there is NO real discussion coming from the industry and its lobbyists.
The content of RFK Jr.’s speech will spread far and wide. The air horns on the coal trucks only annoy for a few moments and maybe a mile at best.
Will the coal industry continue to mislead its workforce through scare tactics just to pad their investors, or will they do the right thing and approach the future with a willingness to compromise for the sake of their employees, communities, and oh – the kids?
To quote RFK “They’re forever impoverishing the communities.”
Take a look at this web site.
http://www.vaceda.org/
This group is funded by a tax on the coal industry.
In regards to the argument that MTR has cost jobs. So has every other technological advance in this country. Are we supposed to go back to mining coal with a pick and shovel?
rs
“… approach the future with a willingness to compromise ..”
Are you willing to?
Engineer — Great point! Virginia got it right compared to West Virginia. http://www.vaceda.org/ is a model for WVa should have done 20 years ago. Unfortunately, there’s nothing like that here in W.Va. It’s not too late to get started.
It’s fantastic to see you embracing the spirit of compromise.
What existing demands or practices do you think the coal industry ought to show flexibility on?
I didn’t know we “the coal industry” were making any demands other than to be able to keep working.
I was asking rs if he / she was willing to compromise since he / she made that offer. Senator Byrd also made a reference to compromise / meeting in the middle. Is the environmental community willing to compromise?
What a wonderful experience to be able to exercise your freedom of speech without incident. Thanks to the police for doing a great job of keeping the crowds apart. Only one person came into our permitted space in an attempt to engage our peaceful demonstraters.
It was great to have horns honking because they loved mountains and flags waving in support of America.
While I am heartbroken at the blasting on Coal River Mountain, I am confident the Obama administration is working to halt this destruction throughout Appalachia. As we were speaking in Charleston, WV to halt the blasting, a virtual tour of Coal River Mountain was being shown in Copenhagen. Hopefully, we will remember, the world is watching.
Well It had to happen sooner or later. Just yesterday the employees at CONSOL’s FOLA operations were issued a WARN notice. In 60 days all employees, about 300, will be wards of the state. This is brought about by a radical few who have found a liberal Judge and challenged our permit on a technicality. 300 people will now be out of work because a few thought a entire permit should be published in the paper. The economy of Clay county will be devestated. Nicholas county will like wise be harsly effected by loss of coal severence taxes . Just this year 10 teacher positions in Nicholas County are going to be eliminated because of declines in coal severence taxes. Just think of how many will now be effected because this permit in question lies on the border of Clay and Nicholas. This layoff includes all of our underground brothers because they dont mine enough coal to justify the expence of the plant and loadout. Well I hope everyone is happy that a mountain and a hollar that your have never seen. A creek that salmanders wouldnt live in, and trees that have all ready went up in smoke are going to be saved. Please dont give me any of the green economy stuff this morning, Im not in the mood. Im a surface miner, like my father before me. I plan on continuing to be a surface miner. Be it in Wyoming, Nevada, Arizona, Montana or Northern Canada, Ill be tearing up mother earth somewhere.
Engineer — I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that last comment was a bit tongue in check. When you say that:
—
“I didn’t know we “the coal industry” were making any demands other than to be able to keep working.”
—
I would expand that to say… yes, the coal industry wants to keep mining even when it is unsafe, harmful, or illegal to do so.
Just because something is good for “the coal industry” does not mean it is good for West Virginia.
The “coal industry” in West Virginia is demanding that its interests be placed ahead of all others individuals and industries. Coal spokespeople routinely exaggerate the positive impacts of coal and ignore the negative impacts. Coal interests are drowning out other voices (literally) who are attempting to have civil discourse about the future of W.Va. Coal interests are attempting to stop the deliberative enforcement of existing laws.
MTR has been a really bad compromise position for decades. It has not lived up to its end of the bargain. For example, only a tiny fraction of former MTR sites are developed.
Speaking just for myself, I suppose one compromise I’m willing to make is that I’m resigned to there being funding for carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects.
I think that it is an irresponsible waste of money with potentially devastating environmental consequences, but if CCS R&D funding is necessary in order to pass an energy/climate change bill, so be it. Still, the less the better and I’d like to see more money for other things that are far more likely to help coal mining communities past and present.
So, please, tell me again. You’re invoking a spirit of compromise. Where do you see room for compromise by W.Va. coal interests?
Should they join at the table to discuss climate change mitigation? Should they get serious about discussing ways to surface mine that protect cumulative water quality impacts? Should they stop sending out counter-protesters who attempt to shout down competing rallies?
Let’s talk.
scott14 sorry about your job. I’m sure you’ll, as you say, find some more of mother earth to tear up somewhere else. Don’t you think that coal companies should follow the rules? Apparently not.
The discussion precipitated by engineer presumes, in the spirit of compromise, that there are two seats at the table. Perhaps more voices, but compromise in this model is along one axis, between poles. I reject that model. Or at the least, like Clem, I desire more clarification.
The above posts show a vividness, an honesty, and an individuality that I very much appreciate. This blog/forum is a great complement to regular journalism. Thanks to all these posters for saying what’s on your mind about these important issues.
Here’s my compromise on coal: you can keep mining it, as long as you follow the letter of the law on AOC, stop making shell companies that fold and abandon property, stop behaving like angry gorillas in public places, stop filling whole valleys and waterways with spoil, and ensure that the water you discharge is at least as clean as when it entered your industrial site.
JB that sounds like a fine idea! And they call that sort of thing compromise?!?!?!?! mind boggling, ain’t it.
The world will soon know how Massey Energy, Inc. and other mtr opertors’ employees act when there is a peaceful meeting going on. Just cheer and jeer at the speakers. Have company coal trucks to blare their horns. That’s is the way the mtr mining employees will be seen on all the national news networks.
Pete Smith says he is concerned about his kids. They depend on coal. He says he has worked in strip mining all his life. With all the hours he works and the money that the mtr coal barons are paying him, surely he has stashed some money away for a rainy day so to speak.
There are other mothers and fathers that have lost their jobs, their houses that don’t even work in the coal industry. I bet these people worry about their children to.
Mr. Blankenship will come up with something to help his employees during these tough times. Besides, if you get cut off, you can draw unemployment benefits.
Good luck to you all. Try to get together and compromise this situation.
Just a quick question to anyone who was at the rally. I saw a sign in a photo in the Daily Mail that said “Friends of Wood”. What is that supposed to mean? Just wondering……
Scott,
Sorry about your job and the 500 others being eliminated in the near future at Consol’s Fola operation due to environmentalists.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idAFN0815794120091208?rpc=44
You bring up a good point on how underground jobs are often dependent on surface operations to survive. But as you know the environmentalists are after all coal jobs.
Good luck, Scott.
Those jobs are gone because Consol chose to eliminate them when it was not able to figure out how to get a coal extraction permit approved. The only victims are the simple minded who swallow the “environmentalist want you to lose your job” bs.
If you don’t believe that employees of coal companies are pawns in the quest to maintain the status quo of extractive industry with maximum profit and minimum responsibility, you have a much rosier view of what people do to each other for money than I do.
Yeah it’s not like they didn’t know the rules and it’s not like they didn’t choose to not follow them. But it’s still the fault of some nameless faceless hippies. Good Lord.
Folks,
I’ve just added a new post about the CONSOL layoffs, sorting out what the court decision said, and how those layoffs could have been avoided:
http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2009/12/08/consol-to-lay-off-500-miners-but-who-is-to-blame/
Ken.
On the compromise issue:
coal operators have been given free reign, with the support and purposeful neglect of federal agencies and former President Bush and Clinton and Reagan, for three decades now. You were given a free ticket to ignore the law and destroy the Appalachian mountains.
The impact of coal goes far beyond the mining though, including the contamination of water resources from coal slurry injections and sludge ponds, Black Lung and a higher incidence of cancer in the coalfields, contamination of water from coal ash ponds, acid rain from sulfur, and climate change, to name some of the biggies.
So how about this concept, as a starter for the conversation.
With all of those impacts happening, with the true cost of coal throughout it’s lifecycle, the least you can give us is the remaining mountains. A ban on MTR ‘is’ the compromise, its what you can give us, and anti-MTR folks in the coalfields will continue to support underground mining.
What are you offering?
Yesterday’s duelling rallies were like deja vu all over again from 1999, when the first big MTR case was litigated. Back then, there were all kinds of rallies, on both sides, all through summer and fall.
Lots of vitriol. It’s like we’ve gotten nowhere over the past decade. Nowhere.
Mayflyguy I have been in the environmental movement for quite a number of years, and I saw the sign you referred to as well. I have no idea what was meant by that sign. I wondered about it myself. I started to go ask the gentleman about it and got side tracked by saying hello to many friends I had not seen in awhile. If you find out please post it and I will do the same.
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