EPA Weighs in on Mountaintop Permits

  • In mountaintop removal mining, explosives are used to get at coal that's close to the surface. (Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress)

The Environmental Protection
Agency has approved one
mountaintop removal coal
mining operation. But, Lester
Graham reports, it’s asking a
federal court to delay another
mine in the same state:

Transcript

The Environmental Protection
Agency has approved one
mountaintop removal coal
mining operation. But, Lester
Graham reports, it’s asking a
federal court to delay another
mine in the same state:

The Environmental Protection Agency says it supports permits for one mine in West Virginia because operators agreed to some environmental protections.

But the EPA is asking a federal court to delay a decision on another mine. The Spruce Number One mine – owned by a subsidiary of Arch Coal – is one of the largest mountainop removal mines ever proposed in the area.The EPA says it’s concerned the mine would bury streams and contaminate water.

Bill Raney is the President of the West Virginia Coal Association. In a recent interview he said regulators are changing the rules.

“And it’s punishing the people here with uncertainty, not knowing what the future holds as to whether you’re going to get the next permit and are you going to be able to mine the coal, are you going to be able to use it in the power plant.”

The EPA administrator, Lisa Jackson, said in a statement, the EPA is actually bringing clarity to the process.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

Mountaintop Mining Protest

  • One of the organizers of the rally opposing mountaintop removal coal mining scheduled the protest to coincide with the first day of climate talks in Copenhagen. (Photo by Sandra Sleight-Brennan)

World leaders are in Copenhagen,
Denmark where the debate over
what to do about climate change
is getting loud sometimes. But
in West Virginia coal country, the
debate is even louder. Lester
Graham reports:

Transcript

World leaders are in Copenhagen,
Denmark where the debate over
what to do about climate change
is getting loud sometimes. But
in West Virginia coal country, the
debate is even louder. Lester
Graham reports:

When the West Virginia Coal Association heard about plans for a rally to protest mountaintop removal coal mining, it issued an email. The Associaiton wanted supporters of the coal industry to hold a counter protest to the quote, “liberal enviro-whacko’s rally.”

(sound of protest and truck horns)

The coal mining supporters not only showed up, but they brought in some big trucks, horns blaring to try to disrupt the protest speakers at the rally in front of the offices of West Virginia’s Department of Environmental Quality.

The Coal industry’s message was simple. Coal means jobs. Jobs mean paychecks.

But the protestors against mountaintop removal coal mining say there are more important things.

One of those speakers was Maria Gunnoe. She’s a coal miner’s daughter who’s worked against the environmental damage of blowing off the tops of Appalaichan mountains to get to the coal. The blasted debris has been dumped into valleys, damaging streams and water supplies.

“I challenge you. You think it’s hard to live without a paycheck? Try living with nothing to give your children to drink. Paycheck’s not important when you don’t have water to give your children.”

Maria Gunnoe has been there. She lives in a valley just downhill from a debris fill. She testified against the coal companies in a court case to stop them from dumping debris in streams. Let’s just say she’s not a popular figure among the pro-coal folks.

Bo Webb lives in Coal River Valley. He’s one of the organizers of the rally opposing mountaintop removal coal mining. He scheduled the protest the same day climate talks in Copenhagen started. He’d liked to see the people where he lives get something from those negotiations.

“I’m hoping what comes out of Copenhagen for here would be a message that some of these miners could start understanding and stop manipu- allowing- themselves to be manipulated by a coal industry that’s got one concern, and that’s profits.”

At the counter-rally, many of the coal mining supporters did not want to talk to news people. One guy who would talk is Gary Finley. He’s from Ohio and sells equipment to the coal mining industry.

“You know, this industry is regulated, heavily regulated, now. It has been since, what, 1977? (Yep.) So, you know, we’re doing everything that’s dictated by law in the mining of coal.”

When asked about the future of coal, Finley hesitated.

“Well, (laughs) right now I’m uncertain. I can tell you what I hope it’ll be. I hope it continues. You know, we’ve got a lot of coal in these mountains. I don’t believe the people in this country realize how important coal is to the economy of the eastern United States, people realize when they go into their homes and turn on their light switch and the electric comes on, if we don’t mine coal, that’s gonna be- it’s done.”

The protest was a lot of passionate speakers, a lot of booing, and a lot of truck horns.

But what irritated the coal mining supporters more than anything seemed to be the idea that outsiders were coming to West Virginia to tell them what to do. And the liberal outsider that aggravated them most was environmentalist Robert Kennedy, Junior. Kennedy calls fossil fuels a deadly addiction that’s wrecking the country, and says mountaintop removal coal mining is destroying communities.

“And, you know, we need to figure out ways to power our country that don’t compromise the aspirations of future generations, don’t compromise their potential for prosperity, for wholesome, dignified communities.”

In the end, nothing was settled in West Virginia, just as nothing will be settled in Copenhagen.

But at the local level and the international level, people are talking about fossil fuels differently. Some see a bright future in renewable, sustainable energy and preserved forested mountains, while others feel their lives and their livelihoods threatened.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

Mountaintop Mining Applications Held Up

  • In mountaintop removal mining, explosives are used to get at coal that's close to the surface. (Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress)

The Environmental Protection Agency
is holding up nearly 80 permit
applications for coal mining projects
because of concerns about about water
quality. Tamara Keith
reports this is creating a different
kind of concern in Appalachian coal
country:

Transcript

The Environmental Protection Agency
is holding up nearly 80 permit
applications for coal mining projects
because of concerns about about water
quality. Tamara Keith
reports this is creating a different
kind of concern in Appalachian coal
country:

The applications involve mountain top removal coal mining. Explosives are used to get at coal that’s close to the surface.

In the past, the mining companies have been allowed to fill in valleys with the leftover rock and dirt. But the EPA is concerned that streams are getting buried and polluted so the agency is now giving that practice a serious second look.

Carol Raulston is with the National Mining Association. She says holding up those permits have people in the mining towns of Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee worried about losing their jobs.

“You really can’t operate these mines and employ people at them unless you’re able to construct the fills and in many of these communities they are the sole employer.”

An EPA spokesperson says protecting drinking water and coal mining jobs are both important. The agency says both can be done.

For The Environment Report, I’m Tamara Keith.

Related Links

A Look Into Coal Country

  • The filmmakers want more Americans to understand that when we flick on a light switch – it is not a meaningless act. It takes electricity. And that takes coal. (Photo courtesy of Coal Country)

When the Senate picks up debate
on the climate change bill, it
will be – in part – deciding the
future of coal as an energy source
in the U.S. About half the nation’s
electricity currently comes from
coal. And a lot of it comes from
the Appalachian region. A new
documentary film sets out to show
how mining for coal affects the people
who live in Coal Country. Julie Grant
spoke with the film’s producers:

Transcript

When the Senate picks up debate
on the climate change bill, it
will be – in part – deciding the
future of coal as an energy source
in the U.S. About half the nation’s
electricity currently comes from
coal. And a lot of it comes from
the Appalachian region. A new
documentary film sets out to show
how mining for coal affects the people
who live in Coal Country. Julie Grant
spoke with the film’s producers:

Mari-Lynn Evans and Phylis Geller set out to make the movie Coal Country
because they wanted to show how different people are affected by coal
mining.

They found lots of activists, and regular citizens, who would talk with
them. Plenty of people were willing to show the thick black water in their
toilet tanks. They wanted to show the black soot covering their cars.
They wanted to talk about the health problems they live with. And they all
blamed the coal industry.

Evans also wrote to coal supporters – to get their side of the story on
camera. The answer?

“No. That was their response. I sent out requests to the coal industry,
to coal companies and to suppliers of the coal industry.”

Evans brother is a coal miner. He supports mountain top removal.

(sound of explosions)

As we see in the movie, that’s when coal companies blow off the entire
top of a mountain to get to the coal. Many people consider it the most
polluting and environmentally devastating type of mining.

But Evans says not even her own brother would do an interview about it.

“And when I said, ‘why won’t you talk on camera? You feel so
passionately that coal is wonderful and mountaintop removal is actually for
the environment as well as the economy.’ And his response to me always
was, ‘oh I would never speak on camera without getting permission from
the company I work for.’”

The filmmakers heard that a lot. And no coal miners ever did get
permission to talk on camera.

In the movie, we do hear from Don Blankenship, head of Massey Energy. He
spoke at a public hearing about the need to ease environmental restrictions
on coal mining.

“We had nearly 800 employees up ‘til Friday. We had to lay 8 off. I
think that might be just the tip of the iceberg if we don’t our rules
changed how we mine in the state.”

Anti-coal activists at the public hearing explain how the coal companies
use that kind of intimidation to control miners.

“I think people are scared that they will lose their jobs and be flipping
burgers. You look out and that’s all you see. You see mining and
flipping burgers. And, I argue, that the coal companies want it that way.
They want that to be the only option. That’s the only way they could get
support for how they treat their workers and how they treat this land.
This would never happen in a place that wasn’t poor. Never.”

In the movie, some coal miners stand up at the public meeting to defend the
companies they work for. One explains the coal industry has provided him a
good salary.

Miner One: “For the last 14 years, the coal industry has supported myself
and my wife and my 3 children.”

Miner Two: “When the last one of you so-called environmentalists leave
the state, when the rest of us leave for North Carolina, turn out the
lights. Oh, wait a minute, there won’t be no lights. No coal, no
lights.”

(music)

The filmmakers want more Americans to understand that when we flick on a
light switch – it is not a meaningless act. It takes electricity. And
that takes coal.

And, as anti-coal activist Judy Bonds says in the movie, coal is tearing
apart West Virginia.

“It is a civil war; it’s families against families. It’s brother
against brother.”

Or – in the case of filmmaker Mari Lynn-Evans – brother against
sister.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

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Fighting Over Oil and Water

  • The richest oil shale deposits lie in the Piceance Basin, which runs northwest of the town of Rifle, Colorado. The bands of dark grey along the edge of this snow- capped ridge are oil shale. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

In the future, keeping your gas tank full could make disputes over water in the American
West a lot worse. It’s because energy companies hope to develop the oil shale industry.
Getting oil from shale requires lots of water, and the richest oil shale deposits happen to be
in the dry state of Colorado. Shawn Allee headed there to see why a fight over water and
oil could be in the works:

Transcript

In the future, keeping your gas tank full could make disputes over water in the American
West a lot worse. It’s because energy companies hope to develop the oil shale industry.
Getting oil from shale requires lots of water, and the richest oil shale deposits happen to be
in the dry state of Colorado. Shawn Allee headed there to see why a fight over water and
oil could be in the works:

Oil companies have their eyes on vast oil shale deposits in western Colorado, Utah and
Wyoming.

The federal government says companies could pull 800 billion barrels of oil out of that shale.

That’s about three times the proven oil reserves in Saudi Arabia.

Oil shale’s an impressive resource but it depends on water and there’s not much available
there.

How much would an oil shale industry need?

Shell Oil PR guy Tracy Boyd says the simple answer is that it will likely take his company
three barrels of water to extract one barrel of oil.

It’s because oil shale doesn’t really have oil in it – it’s got something called kerogen.

“You can heat this kerogen up. If you do it really slow, which we do for about 3.5 –
4 years, by putting heaters down in the rock formation, (you) produce a crude-oil
like material but with a little processing this is the first product we get out of it
which basically transportation fuels.”

Heating the ground require loads of electricity from new power plants and generators, and
they’d be cooled by water.

Oil companies are just experimenting with shale right now, but they’re securing rights to
water just in case.

Shell’s latest water claim is on Colorado’s Yampa River.

When Shell filed its court papers – some town governments warned they might fight the
claim.

One of these towns was Parker – a Denver suburb hundreds of miles east of the oil shale
region.

Frank Jaeger runs Parker’s water district.

Jaeger says, like other Colorado cities, Parker plans to expand.

“We know approximately what our numbers are and it will be somewhere in the
neighborhood of 150,000 people. In order to assure 150,000 people for another
150 years from now, I have to be proactive, I have to be at the front of the line for
the next drop of water available in the State of Colorado.”

Oil shale developers and cities across Colorado are set to fight over the water they might
need for the future, but some feel oil companies already have an edge.

“They’re actually one step ahead of the game.”

David Ableson is with Western Resource Advocates, an environmental group.

Ableson says energy companies tried developing oil shale several times in the last century.

They failed, but each time, they bought more water rights – just in case.

Now, they’ve got loads of water rights – and if the industry takes off, they’ll use them.

That could stop cities like Denver and its suburbs from getting water they hoped to have for
new homes and businesses.

Ableson says this isn’t just a Colorado fight, though.

He says some congressmen sell the idea of oil shale as an energy source the whole country
can depend on – even though its future could get tied up in Colorado water courts.

“And so, folks who are looking at this issue who do not live in CO, UT, or WY, need
to understand that when an elected official says, “this can solve our energy woes,”
that it’s actually a far more complicated situation than that and if there are severe
water impacts, that makes it much less likely that you could develop that
resource.”

The energy industry claims the concern over water is overblown – they say they just might
not need all that much water.

Ableson says that’s only true if oil shale fails. But if it succeeds, and we fill up on oil shale
gasoline – he predicts some towns or industries in the West will be left dry.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

Government Looks to Clean Up Coal

  • Energy Secretary Steven Chu says coal will have to be a part of the energy mix in the future, so the government is committing money to clean it up. (Photo courtesy of the USDOE)

President Obama’s Energy Secretary is talking about building a facility to find ways to burn coal more cleanly. Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

President Obama’s Energy Secretary is talking about building a facility to find ways to burn coal more cleanly. Lester Graham reports:

Burning coal pollutes – acid rain, toxic mercury, soot. And lately the big concern – carbon dioxide, the chief greenhouse gas contributing to global warming.

The Secretary of Energy, Steven Chu told Members of Congress, despite the concerns about pollution, we still depend on coal for half of our electricity.

“So, it’s very important that we develop the technology that captures and also that safely sequesters carbon from coal plants.”

The technology does not exist today.

Chu says three-point-four-billion dollars in government stimulus money is now available to find a way to clean up coal.

An experimental plant called Futuregen was supposed to find ways to burn coal more cleanly and do something about carbon dioxide emissions. But the Bush administration killed funding.

Secretary Chu says the Obama administration is now negotiating with Futuregen partners again.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

Mountaintop Removal Continues

  • In his last days, President Bush changed rules that made it easier to blow off the tops of mountains to mine for coal. (Photo by Sandra Sleight-Brennan)

The Obama Administration has
approved handing out as many
as 42 new permits to mining
companies for mountaintop
removal coal mining. Lester
Graham reports a lot of people
expected the Environmental
Protection Agency to block
new mountaintop removal mining
in Appalachia:

Transcript

The Obama Administration has
approved handing out as many
as 42 new permits to mining
companies for mountaintop
removal coal mining. Lester
Graham reports a lot of people
expected the Environmental
Protection Agency to block
new mountaintop removal mining
in Appalachia:

Environmentalists say this is the most environmentally destructive kind of coal mining there is. It blows off the tops of mountains, fills in valleys, pollutes creeks and water supplies.

But the EPA does not have the authority to block it with no reason. The agency has to follow the permitting process in place.

Oliver Bernstein is with the environmental group the Sierra Club.

“They are operating under a fundamentally flawed legal framework around mountaintop removal and so the Obama Administration will need to take the bold steps to enact the rule-makings that will help to end this process completely.”

Environmentalists are calling for the White House Council on Environmental Quality to step in and do whatever is necessary to stop the mountaintop removal coal mining.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

A New Threat to Grizzly Bears

  • The grizzly bear has a new threat - the Mountain Pine Beetle that's wiping out its food source (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)

We’ve heard about a warmer climate affecting polar bears. Now, warmer weather seems to be threatening another kind of bear. Mark Brush reports on some tough times for Yellowstone’s Grizzly bears:

Transcript

We’ve heard about a warmer climate affecting polar bears. Now, warmer weather seems to be threatening another kind of bear. Mark Brush reports on some tough times for Yellowstone’s Grizzly bears:

Researchers say warmer temperatures in the last ten to fifteen years have been messing with the ecology in Yellowstone National Park.

In the fall, the grizzly bears eat pine cone nuts from white bark pine trees. It gives them a lot of nutrition before they curl up for the winter. But those trees are dying.

Mountain pine beetles are killing them. The beetle populations usually get knocked back by cold weather. But it hasn’t been getting as cold. So, there are more beetles killing more trees.

Doug Peacock lives near Yellowstone and has written several books on grizzlies.

“The white bark pine trees, this is the most important grizzly food of all in Yellowstone, they are gone. And we will not see them come back in our lifetime.”

And when the trees are gone, the bears get hungry – they go looking for food – and they run into people.

48 grizzlies out of the 600 in the region were killed last year.

Some environmental groups are suing the government to get the bear back on the endangered species list.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

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Yucca Mountain: One Man Switches Sides

  • Yucca Mountain is the nation's planned repository for spent nuclear fuel (Photo courtesy of the US Department of Energy)

Politically speaking, America’s nuclear waste storage policy is a mess. Hazardous spent nuclear fuel is supposed to be buried under Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, but after two decades – it’s not finished. Congress pushed the project onto Nevada in the 80s by passing what’s known as the “Screw Nevada Bill.” Shawn Allee met a man who regrets helping put nuclear waste at Nevada’s doorstep:

Transcript

Politically speaking, America’s nuclear waste storage policy is a mess. Hazardous spent nuclear fuel is supposed to be buried under Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, but after two decades – it’s not finished. Congress pushed the project onto Nevada in the 80s by passing what’s known as the “Screw Nevada Bill.” Shawn Allee met a man who regrets helping put nuclear waste at Nevada’s doorstep:

For twenty years Nevada’s tried to scuttle Yucca Mountain.

Along the way, it’s hired Robert Halstead to create a plan to soften the blow if it loses. He’s an expert on nuclear waste truck and rail transportation.

“My job would be to craft the safest, or least-bad, transportation system so that if Nevada got stuck with a repository they would at least have some control of the transportation system because the activity that most likely to injures people and the environment is transportation.”

Halstead didn’t start his nuclear career on Nevada’s side, though. Thirty years ago, he worked for Wisconsin. He says the federal government wanted states’ help in storing nuclear waste deep underground.

In 1982 Congress came to consensus about how to test sites. He trusted it – and built political support for it.

“There was a clear statement that safety was not enough and economic efficiency was not enough. You also had to deal with regional equity.”

The gist was that there’d be at least two nuclear waste repositories: one in the West, and one in the East.

“We were pretty optimistic. Unfortunately that all began to fall apart very quickly.”

Congressmen and even the public started getting cold feet about the site selection process.

There were rowdy protests, especially in states that may have had the right geology for a repository. That included Wisconsin.

“If there was an objective approach to picking the sites, we knew that we would be in the first tier of the sites that would be evaluated.”

After a few years, Eastern politicians got frantic.

“They asked for a fix.”

Halstead decided to help with this fix, because he’d lost faith in the system, too. He says he helped cut legislative deals to stop the nuclear waste law he’d supported just a few years earlier.

It worked.

In 1987, Congress ended the government’s search for a nuclear waste repository.

Yucca would be the only candidate.

“This law was written very carefully to ensure that Nevada got screwed. And you know what, it chilled my blood.”

Halstead realized he’d passed a law that broke that early consensus about regional equity.

He was disappointed, and nearly dumped nuclear politics, but then he got a call. It was from a chief nuclear official in Nevada.

“He said aren’t you ashamed of yourself? I would really like you to come out here and help us. And I said to him, ‘I’d just got done getting Wisconsin getting off the hook and if I help you get off the hook, I think it’s likely that they’ll have to come back to Wisconsin.’”

But Halstead took the job.

I’ve asked him why several times. Sometimes he’s said guilt. Sometimes, regret. Sometimes, for a job.

Right now, Congress is considering cutting Yucca Mountain’s budget, and President Obama says he’s against the project.

But the law to make Yucca the only choice is still on the books.

I ask Robert Halstead whether that will change. He’s not sure – it’ll be tough to build a new consensus even close to what he saw thirty years ago.

“If nuclear waste disposal in a repository were safe and profitable, someone would have taken it away from Nevada years ago, so there won’t be an amicable ending to this story.”

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

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Turning the Ski Slopes Green

  • Ski resorts are one of a growing number of businesses trying to be more sustainable (Photo by Baileypalblue, source: Wikimedia Commons)

Back in February, President Obama proposed $150 billion to employ people in “green collar jobs.” The idea was to create jobs that benefited the environment. But he also wanted to boost the economy. A ski resort wanted to be one step ahead. So it hired a new employee to help its 2,500 acres “go green.” Irene Noguchi reports:

Transcript

Back in February, President Obama proposed $150 billion to employ people in “green collar jobs.” The idea was to create jobs that benefited the environment. But he also wanted to boost the economy. A ski resort wanted to be one step ahead. So it hired a new employee to help its 2,500 acres “go green.” Irene Noguchi reports:

(sound of rustling cans)

Ross Freeman crawls into a giant recycling container. His legs are sticking out.

He holds a long rake and shuffles the cans inside.

“We actually fill this thing up to the brim with recycling. Ends up being 2,000 or 2,500 pounds of recycling we send off the mountain every 10 to 12 days.”

(sound of mixing cans around)

This is part of his job. Ross Freeman is the eco-steward at Stevens Pass. It’s a ski resort tucked in the Cascade Mountains in Washington state.

His official title is “Environment and Sustainability Manager.” Stevens Pass created that position last year, when it wanted to make itself more eco-friendly.

John Meriwether is director of planning and environmental services at the resort. He’s worked here for 16 years.

“The ski industry has changed a lot. And really, the biggest change I think is them realizing how much global warming is affecting their business. The industry as a whole makes a lot of snow and one degree difference in the climate can change that.”

Meriwether says ski resorts are pushing more money into fighting global warming.

Stevens Pass pledged to offset all its emissions with energy credits. It’s the only resort in the Pacific Northwest that does this.

Ross Freeman’s work is on the ground. He drags out furniture that can’t go in the landfill. He recycles rubber wheels from the ski lifts.

“Then the next moment I’m up in the office designing a policy for vehicle idling, then I’m applying for grants, applying for industry awards, then I’m out in the food and beverage world, talking to cooks and chefs in the kitchens to figure out how we can be more efficient and waste less food.”

All this is part of the resort’s efforts to meet the national “green” standards. The National Ski Areas Association has 21 environmental guidelines it wants resorts to follow. It’s called Sustainable Slopes. The Ski Association says 190 resorts endorse it, including Stevens Pass.

Ryan Bidwell is the executive director of Colorado Wild. It’s an environmental group that grades ski resorts. He says endorsing the Ski Association’s Sustainable Slopes guidelines is different than actually following them.

“To be a part of the Sustainable Slopes program, a resort just has to say, ‘Yeah, we agree with these principles.’ They don’t actually have to take any action. Sustainable Slopes contains a whole laundry list of fantastic ideas that
resorts can and should be doing, but there’s no accountability in the program.”

Bidwell’s group grades ski resorts on everything from recycling to the effect on old growth forests. So how “green” was Stevens Pass on the environmental score card?

“Stevens received a ‘C’ because it has some expansion plans that would extend the resort into currently undeveloped areas and would impact those sensitive areas. So they lose a few points on that side.”

But Bidwell says hiring an eco-steward like Ross Freeman is a step in the right direction.

(sound of feet crunching the snow)

Freeman says there are only a few jobs like his. But he hopes more ski resorts will start hiring folks like him when they go green.

For The Environment Report, I’m Irene Noguchi.

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