Hearing the stories of the devastation caused by Mountaintop Removal coal mining is what first got me involved in social justice. A few years later, I continue to be outraged by what my friends in Eastern Kentucky deal with daily, but I now also find myself enthralled by what is happening in my hometown, Louisville, with coal ash.

In February, I first learned of E.ON’s plans to add a 60-acre coal-combustion waste (CCW) landfill adjacent to their Cane Run Rd. power plant in South Louisville, five miles away from the neighborhood I grew up in and from where I now live. Coal ash is a new issue to me and to many folks, but one thing’s for sure, it’s not the kind of stuff you want in your neighborhood or next to your city’s water source. Coal ash contains concentrated amounts of heavy metals and other pollutants that have been found to cause cancer and other health problems in humans. A 2007 EPA report found that those living near coal ash dumps have a 1 in 50 chance of getting cancer. There is already a coal ash impoundment at the Cane Run Rd. site that the EPA considers “high hazard,” meaning that a dam break is likely to cause significant damage, including loss of life.

Last Tuesday, concerned citizens were given the opportunity to speak out at a public hearing held by the Kentucky Division of Waste Management. More than 125 people filed into the cafeteria at Conway Middle School, and while some were members of environmental organizations,  most of the people there were residents who live next to the proposed coal ash landfill site who organized entirely on their own.

Several people who spoke at the hearing told of health problems they and their neighbors have ranging from high instances of asthma, learning disabilities, kidney disease, and multiple forms of cancer. Some noted that the area is polluted enough with not only the Cane Run Rd. power station, but also multiple chemical companies and an old toxic chemical dump. Monica Burkhead, a resident of Riverside Gardens who organized people in her neighborhood to come to the hearing by putting up fliers and going door-to-door, said of the already-standing coal ash landfill, “You’ve got black soot everywhere; you buy a new car and within two years, your car’s paint job is shot. You’ve got kids that have learning disabilities. There’s excessive amounts of ADHD. There’s excessive amounts of cancer, kidney disease. People are sick there constantly. They’re dying. I’m just sick and tired of it. I’ve lived there for 35 years and all I do is watch people die.”

Terri Humphrey gave comment while she and Monica held photos of the proposed site and of the 2008 Kingston coal ash spill. She spoke to the dangers of coal ash and to the frustration of finding discrepancies in information on the proposed landfill from different agencies who have a say in the process. Many residents didn’t even find out about the hearing until a day or two before.

One older woman who’s lived in Riverside Gardens for decades, Rose Wilson, fought back tears as she told the room that she’s raised so many kids, her own and the neighborhood’s, and is so tired of seeing them all get sick.

While the room was filled with people who are justifiably upset about this proposal, there was also a strong sense of community and need to act. A second hearing was promised by the Kentucky Department of Waste Management official who moderated the hearing, and Metro Council representative Judy Green said she and neighboring Council representative Rick Blackwell will introduce a resolution to try to halt the application process until the EPA makes a decision on how to regulate coal ash. Still, the greatest sense of urgency came from community members.

Adonna Williams, a resident of Riverside Gardens said, “Everybody, they get upset and they want to slack off, but you’ve got to stand there, you’ve got to fight the fight. If you don’t fight the fight, if you don’t keep on, if you don’t keep going, then they’ll always win.”

Let’s keep fighting the fight.

Take Action!

Stand with Adonna, Monica, and other residents of South Louisville and speak out against this proposed coal ash landfill. Comments may be submitted in writing by the close of business on June 18th to:

Ronald D. Gruzesky, P.E.

Division of Waste Management

200 Fair Oaks

Frankfort, KY 40601-1190

Please reference AI # 2121 and Application APE200100001 on any correspondence.

Filed under: Act Locally, Coal, Dirty Energy

Hearing the stories of the devastation caused by Mountaintop Removal coal mining is what first got me involved in social justice. A few years later, I continue to be outraged by what my friends in Eastern Kentucky deal with daily, but I now also find myself enthralled by what is happening in my hometown, Louisville, with coal ash.

In February, I first learned of E.ON’s plans to add a 60-acre coal-combustion waste (CCW) landfill adjacent to their Cane Run Rd. power plant in South Louisville, five miles away from the neighborhood I grew up in and from where I now live. Coal ash is a new issue to me and to many folks, but one thing’s for sure, it’s not the kind of stuff you want in your neighborhood or next to your city’s water source. Coal ash contains concentrated amounts of heavy metals and other pollutants that have been found to cause cancer and other health problems in humans. A 2007 EPA report found that those living near coal ash dumps have a 1 in 50 chance of getting cancer. There is already a coal ash impoundment at the Cane Run Rd. site that the EPA considers “high hazard,” meaning that a dam break is likely to cause significant damage, including loss of life.

Last Tuesday, concerned citizens were given the opportunity to speak out at a public hearing held by the Kentucky Division of Waste Management. More than 125 people filed into the cafeteria at Conway Middle School, and while some were members of environmental organizations,  most of the people there were residents who live next to the proposed coal ash landfill site who organized entirely on their own.

Several people who spoke at the hearing told of health problems they and their neighbors have ranging from high instances of asthma, learning disabilities, kidney disease, and multiple forms of cancer. Some noted that the area is polluted enough with not only the Cane Run Rd. power station, but also multiple chemical companies and an old toxic chemical dump. Monica Burkhead, a resident of Riverside Gardens who organized people in her neighborhood to come to the hearing by putting up fliers and going door-to-door, said of the already-standing coal ash landfill, “You’ve got black soot everywhere; you buy a new car and within two years, your car’s paint job is shot. You’ve got kids that have learning disabilities. There’s excessive amounts of ADHD. There’s excessive amounts of cancer, kidney disease. People are sick there constantly. They’re dying. I’m just sick and tired of it. I’ve lived there for 35 years and all I do is watch people die.”

Terri Humphrey gave comment while she and Monica held photos of the proposed site and of the 2008 Kingston coal ash spill. She spoke to the dangers of coal ash and to the frustration of finding discrepancies in information on the proposed landfill from different agencies who have a say in the process. Many residents didn’t even find out about the hearing until a day or two before.

One older woman who’s lived in Riverside Gardens for decades, Rose Wilson, fought back tears as she told the room that she’s raised so many kids, her own and the neighborhood’s, and is so tired of seeing them all get sick.

While the room was filled with people who are justifiably upset about this proposal, there was also a strong sense of community and need to act. A second hearing was promised by the Kentucky Department of Waste Management official who moderated the hearing, and Metro Council representative Judy Green said she and neighboring Council representative Rick Blackwell will introduce a resolution to try to halt the application process until the EPA makes a decision on how to regulate coal ash. Still, the greatest sense of urgency came from community members.

Adonna Williams, a resident of Riverside Gardens said, “Everybody, they get upset and they want to slack off, but you’ve got to stand there, you’ve got to fight the fight. If you don’t fight the fight, if you don’t keep on, if you don’t keep going, then they’ll always win.”

Let’s keep fighting the fight.

Take Action!

Stand with Adonna, Monica, and other residents of South Louisville and speak out against this proposed coal ash landfill. Comments may be submitted in writing by the close of business on June 18th to:

Ronald D. Gruzesky, P.E.

Division of Waste Management

200 Fair Oaks

Frankfort, KY 40601-1190

Please reference AI # 2121 and Application APE200100001 on any correspondence.

Filed under: Act Locally, Coal, Dirty Energy

It began in January, when Portland General Electric (PGE) made a big announcement: the major Oregon utility, partial owner and sole operator of the Boardman Coal Plant, proposed a possible timeline for phasing out reliance on Boardman.  That was the good news: after months of work on the part of climate activists, PGE had finally acknowledged the risks of associated with their coal-fired coal plant.  The bad news?  The soonest transition date proposed by PGE fell woefully short of what’s needed to protect Oregon’s environment, our economy, and ratepayers being subjected to the risks of coal dependency.  Under PGE’s proposed “2020 Plan,” the Boardman Plant would remain open for a minimum of ten more years.

Media outlets in the Northwest were a-flurry with the news that PGE wanted to decommission its coal plant.  Laudatory news articles and editorials poured in, the vast majority framing the issue as one of the PGE responding to public concerns by doing the right thing for the environment.  Unfortunately, few stories in the mainstream media probed deeply into the validity of claims PGE made to justify their preferred timetable.  Most news sources accepted PGE’s arguments at face value, never asking the essential question of whether a private utility that answers to Wall Street investors should be trusted to essentially regulate itself. 

PGE’s analysis flawed, students take action

Yet while the media grew infatuated with PGE’s 2020 Plan, environmental groups and Oregon students decided to act.  “This state is my home,” said Tyler Gerlach, a freshman at Linfield College, ”and I’m unwilling to stand by and watch the people that live here be trampled on by a utility company.”  We knew the 2020 Plan wouldn’t accomplish what’s needed for both the environment and ratepayers.  The 2020 Plan hinged on state and federal regulatory bodies both granting PGE a waiver for pollution prevention upgrades the utility is required to install in 2015.  A point largely forgotten by the media was that under the 2020 Plan, if pollution waivers aren’t granted, the utility will go back to the original plan of burning coal at Boardman until 2040 or longer. 

If PGE simply made the transition away from Boardman in 2014, it could avoid passing the cost of pollution controls on to ratepayers and eliminate a huge source of carbon on a timescale consistent with Oregon’s pollution reduction goals.  Meanwhile, keeping the plant open until 2020 would commit Oregon to at least another decade of burning coal at Boardman, with the costs of burning coal only likely to get higher over time.  “2020 is just way too long,” said Katie Taylor, an OSPIRG student organizer at Lane Community College, in an interview with the campus paper The Torch. “I think 2014 is a reasonable deadline.”

PGE’s own studies show 2014 is the transition date that’s best for ratepayers, except in scenarios assuming very high future natural gas prices.  In the company’s Integrated Resource Plan, PGE assumes natural gas prices far out of line with projections of third-party bodies like the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.  It’s one of several flawed assumptions in PGE’s 2020 Plan: the utility also fails to consider more than one means of replacing Boardman (building a new natural gas unit), and does not adequately account for the fact that federal action on global warming would increase the costs of burning coal.  It wasn’t surprising PGE would try to tweak the numbers to give the result most convenient for Wall Street shareholders with an interest in keeping Boardman open.  What was more disappointing was that the media seemed poised to let the utility’s assumptions go unquestioned.

Giving Oregon students a voice

Early in the year, youth activists from the Cascade Climate Network, Sierra Student Coalition, and OSPIRG met to forge our strategy for calling PGE out on its claims.  Though students had provided critical input on decisions regarding coal in Oregon over the last several months, we knew what would be needed was an even more organized student voice that could unify campuses across the state in favor of transitioning away from Boardman by 2014.  Our idea was this: by passing student government resolutions at different campuses, we could show that the bodies elected by students to represent their interests were ready to push for a speedy transition away from Boardman.

Unwilling to settle for only those schools already well-connected to Oregon’s Beyond Coal movement, our team of organizers set out to contact as diverse a list of campuses as possible – from large public universities, to small private schools, to community colleges.  To our knowledge, nothing like this had been attempted on this scale in Oregon before: by asking student governments from a large sampling of schools to act in unison on a single issue, our campaign was breaking new ground.

Yet the majority of campuses seemed eager to give students a new voice on this issue.  The first batch of resolutions sailed in within weeks.  “Boardman threatens our climate, air quality and health,” said Zachary Kitamura, a freshman at Pacific University, which was one of the first schools to pass the resolution.  “Ten more years of coal is too long.”

The momentum continues

Our list continued to grow, and soon we picked up our first high school.  The student government at McMinnville High School passed its Beyond Coal resolution after students there decided to launch their own resolution campaign, complete with petition drives and a visit to lobby the principal’s office.  At the campaign’s conclusion, this public high school in semi-rural, conservative-leaning Yamhill County had joined colleges and universities in declaring its student body’s support for moving beyond coal by 2014.  “Boardman is going to close eventually anyway,” said Lindsy Gjesvold of McMinnville High School, explaining her support for the 2014 plan.  “Let’s do it on a timescale that makes sense.” 

The McMinnville High victory came just in time for an Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) public hearing on pollution permits for the Boardman Plant.  By the time of that event, our list of student government resolutions had grown to six.  It was enough to lend new weight to the student voice at the hearing.  Around thirty youth activists turned out in person to that hearing, where citizens concerned about Boardman’s pollution packed two rooms with a total of around 100 bodies.  DEQ staff were visibly impressed, and our presence at the hearing apparently made an impact.  Just a couple weeks later, the DEQ announced it wouldn’t rubber-stamp PGE’s request for a pollution waiver. 

Meanwhile, at Linfield College a fight was brewing.  Students from the campus environmental group had brought up the Beyond Coal resolution, only to meet with unexpectedly strong opposition from a faction that convinced the senate to vote down the resolution on the first attempt to get it passed.  I’ve written about the first half of this story before: long story short, a web search by a student at Linfield revealed the senator heading up the opposition was the son of the Vice President of Transmission and Distribution Services at PGE.  The discovery set the stage for a campus-wide campaign to get the Linfield senate to re-consider the Beyond Coal resolution, and this time do the right thing for their student constituents.

What followed at Linfield was one of the most impressive campus-wide advocacy campaigns I have witnessed at a small private college, made more impressive by the fact that students pulled it off during the busiest time of the year.  The environmental group at Linfield set out to educate the student body about the risks of coal to our environment and economy, collecting over 150 student signatures asking the senate to pass the Beyond Coal resolution.  Linfield students researched PGE’s assumptions in-depth, and pointed out flaws to the senate.  In the week before the final vote, senators received a barrage of emails from constituents asking them to pass the resolution.  The Beyond Coal buzz spread so far that one student studying abroad emailed the senate from an Internet cafe in Mexico City.  Within four weeks, grassroots organizing at Linfield had done its job: at the last senate meeting of the term, the Linfield student government voted near-unanimously to ask PGE to transition from Boardman by 2014.

During the second half of May, the campaign continued accumulating victories that included passage of Beyond Coal resolutions by two of Oregon’s largest colleges – Portland State University and Oregon State University.  Our list now  includes student governments at ten schools, among them major public universities, community colleges, several private universities and colleges, and a high school.  Passing student government resolutions may not sound as flashy as banner-drops and lock-downs, but the result has been to give Oregon students a more organized voice in regional energy decisions than perhaps we’ve ever had before.  With the backing of campus governments representing thousands of Oregon students, we’ll go to decision makers with more credibility than could be achieved in any other way.  It’s just in time too, because one state commission is poised to decide whether PGE’s 2020 Plan gets the go-ahead.

Oregon Public Utility Commission is a key player

This summer, the Oregon Public Utility Commission (OPUC) will review PGE’s 2020 Plan and decide whether it’s a good deal for ratepayers.  This state-level body is charged with looking at utilities’ plans to check that they make sense for customers, deciding whether ratepayer money is best spent the way each utility has proposed.  OPUC can put the brakes on PGE’s plan to keep Boardman open another decade; to do its job right, the commission needs to look carefully at PGE’s assumptions and decide if the its questionable assumptions are reasonable.  If PGE has biased its analysis to make replacing Boardman look more expensive than it is, then approving the 2020 Plan is a bad deal for ratepayers.

“It is in the best interest of Oregonians to close the Boardman Plant by 2014,” said Tyler Gerlach of Linfield, ”and OPUC is supposed to look out for our best interest, not that of a private corporation.”

On college campuses across Oregon, student governments looked at many of the same issues OPUC will consider with regards to PGE’s 2020 Plan.  At Linfield College for example, the personal connection to PGE of one senator meant the senate was fed all PGE’s talking points – which later were discredited by in-depth research by Linfield students.  In the end, the Linfield senate and student governments around the state decided to trust third-party energy analysts above the claims of a utility with an inherent interest in keeping its own coal plant open as long as possible.  One after another student governments have rejected PGE’s assumptions and called for a transition away from Boardman by 2014, not just because of environmental concerns but in the interest of PGE’s ratepayers.  Wall Street investors will benefit if PGE can postpone the closure date of their coal plant as long as possible – but with coal only likely to grow more expensive, ratepayers stand to lose out.

Ten elected student governments are standing with the long list of environmental, consumer, health advocacy, and faith groups calling for a timely move away from Boardman Coal.  By 2014, Oregon’s only in-state coal plant must be replaced by cleaner sources of energy.  The state can then move on to ending ties to coal plants located outside state boundaries.  To meet the charge of protecting Oregon ratepayers, commissions like the OPUC must reject PGE’s 2020 Plan.  By doing so, they can follow in the footsteps of student governments across Oregon that have already spoken up.

Filed under: Act Locally, Cascade Region, Climate Policy, Coal, Coal Campaign, global warming, Political Participation, Youth Leaders

Cross-posted from EnergyActionCoalition.org

To mark the one-month anniversary of the BP drilling disaster, 45 vigils and rallies are planned around the country to call for a Crude Awakening. Oil has been gushing into the Gulf now for one month. With each day that passes, the impacts of our nation’s dirty energy policy becomes more pronounced, but politicians in Washington, DC continue to promote the Big Oil agenda.

Our community is responding – Candlelight vigils are planned across Florida and in Grande Isle, LA, public theatre is taking place in San Antonio at the site of a recent oil refinery explosion, and young people across the state of South Carolina are showing up at the door of Senator Graham’s office to demand he renew his leadership on climate and energy. Fed up with business as usual, and wanting to do something to help the Gulf, they are making their voices heard loud and clear.

Join them by calling your Senators today to demand they respond to the BP drilling disaster by standing up to Big Oil.

Last week the Senate blocked a bill to make BP pay for the cleanup, and this week the “Dirty Air Act” is re-surfacing for consideration. Our Senators need to hear from us, and your voice can help push us in the right direction.

The choices are very clear. Do we continue to allow dirty industry-driven policy to wreak havoc on our country, or do we take action that puts us on the path to a clean and just energy future? Let’s help answer that question ourselves by starting serious conversation with our elected officials today.

Call your Senators to demand a permanent ban on offshore drilling and oppose the Dirty Air Act.

Candlelight vigils and rallies calling for this Crude Awakening are happening right now, but this doesn’t end today. In a few days we’ll send you updates on how the events went, and start to lay out some next steps moving forward. We are getting ready to launch a campaign for this fall to build power for clean energy solutions from the ground up – we know that we are in this for the long haul, and we hope you’ll join us.

Filed under: Act Locally, Coal, Dirty Energy, global warming, Impacted Communities, Oil, Political Participation

I was shocked, once again, as I witnessed the lackadaisical cleanup efforts.  I know that an oil spill cannot be completely cleaned up, but there should at least be an honest and organized effort to do everything we can! I saw highly ineffective plastic booms along the Gulf Coast and a few boats scooping up very miniscule fractions of the spill. Some of the booms have floated ashore, crinkled up on the beach; some sit perpendicular to the shoreline; others are overturned by waves; some pieces of them have broken off and are floating lazily with the waves. The high volume flow of oil, certainly more than 5000 barrels per day, into the Gulf still hasn’t been stopped. What is going on? Why isn’t an effective, organized cleanup being mandated?! This is outrageous.

Several segments of the media are relying on erroneous information from BP and the Coast Guard in reporting the magnitude of the “ongoing cleanup” activities.  Even the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has it wrong. NOAA currently indicates on their maps that there are areas of “potential beached oil” in Venice, Louisiana when there is definite beached oil, whose magnitude of which is far greater than what is depicted on the maps. I have seen it with my own eyes.

Our government’s failure to hold corporations responsible has allowed the spill to run wild and completely out of control. Yes, get angry. It didn’t have to get to this point. We had the cleanup solution to a spill of this enormity. In 1993, nearly 800 million gallons of oil were dumped into the Persian Gulf. They were not only able to prevent this spill from being an environmental catastrophe, but to also salvage 85 percent of the oil. Nick Pozzi, an engineer who worked on that spill, has been offering the lessons he learned to BP. The manager at BP in charge of this cleanup effort, told Pozzi simply not to bother him. BP will not even utilize the advice of educated and experienced scientists and engineers.

There should be someone other than BP directing the cleanup operation from the site of the spill to the threatened coastal estuaries. We are in a dire situation down here, and we need the most qualified people working on this spill.  We need all the help we can get here. It is going to be even more terrible as this slick continues to come onshore.

Please share my stories with all you know. We need this to be a massive wakeup call to the fact that our government is indeed run by the fossil fuel industries. We must stop this, and we need every one of us pushing as hard as we can for a clean energy economy.

Deep down, I am hopeful that positive change will come out of this if we all utilize our anger and momentum. Please know that we have a long, hard fight ahead.

Please stay strong and stay actively fighting with me.

Brinkley Hutchings

Video by John Wathen 5/17/10

Ways you can help:

Send a letter to the editor or host a rally

Contact Secretary Ken Salazar (202) 208-7351
Sample CALL SCRIPT: Hi, my name is _________________, I live in [city, state], and I want Secretary Salazar to stop Shell’s Alaskan drilling and to ban ALL new drilling on US off US coasts.

Send us some hair booms to protect our shorelines

Filed under: Act Locally, Americas, Climate Generation, Climate Justice, Climate Policy, Corporate Responsibility, Corruption, Dirty Energy, Economics, Extraction, global warming, Government, greenwashing, Impacted Communities, Oceans, Oil, Politics, United States, Youth Leaders

As shareholders entered their meeting in the main ballroom of the sheik Jefferson Hotel, activists occupied the adjacent rotunda, chanting loudly and draping a massive banner over the ornate mezzanine railings. The 10’ x 10’ hand-painted banner read, “Massey – Stop Putting Profits Over People!”

“Coal mining is dangerous. It’s dangerous for workers, dangerous for surrounding communities, and dangerous for the future of our planet. It’s time we move off of our dependency on coal and transition to a just, safe, clean energy future.” said Kate Rooth of DC Rising Tide, one of those who disrupted the meeting. “Massey Energy is notorious not only for putting their bottom dollar over people’s safety, but for driving people out their communities and poisoning their drinking water.”

Protesters loudly read an open letter to Massey (below) demanding they cease mountaintop removal coal mining, a practice that is destroying central Appalachian communities. A similar open letter was tendered by two activists who yesterday were assigned an outrageous $100,000 bail after non-violently blocking the driveway to Massey’s regional HQ in Boone County, WV.

As activists disrupted events inside, several hundred unionists and environmentalists rallied in the rain outside – albeit separately – to demand accountability for Massey’s despicable record of dangerous mine conditions, and its devastating social and ecological impact. Rally-goers pointed to the recent explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in Montcoal, WV that killed 29 miners, and its mountaintop removal operations throughout Appalachia in their indictment of Massey’s corporate greed.

The activists arrested today in Richmond, Kate Finneran and Oscar Ramirez, remain in custody as Massey Energy continues jeopardizing workers’ lives and blasting apart mountaintops and communities throughout Appalachia.

(Photo Credits: Props to Chris Eichler)

# # #

OPEN LETTER

Dear Massey Energy,

We interrupt this meeting of Massey Energy’s Shareholders in order to spotlight and oppose Massey’s terrible safety, environmental and human rights violations. It is our responsibility to stand in firm opposition to Massey’s corporate behavior. We are willing to face the legal consequences of our non-violent action, for we know we are not alone; millions in Appalachia and across the nation are coming to see Massey for what it is. Whether it is the mountains of Appalachia, the lives of underground miners deep inside them, or the wellbeing of communities living below, Massey continually puts profits over people. It is time for the people of Appalachia and America to reject Massey and work together to create something better in its place.

“Violations are, unfortunately, a normal part of the mining process,” Don Blankenship, CEO of Massey, has stated. In 2008, Massey made a $20 million settlement with the EPA for 4,500 Clean Water Act violations filed between the year 2000 and 2006. Now, in 2010, they are back in court for polluting America’s waterways again; this time for 971 Clean Water Act violations in 2008 and 2009. A 2006 fire at Massey’s Aracoma mine killed two workers. Massey settled wrongful death lawsuits for an undisclosed sum and paid civil and criminal penalties of $4.2 million. It is clear that neither the EPA, criminal, nor civil fines, can sufficiently motivate Massey, or Blankenship, to adopt a culture of responsibility in their business practices.

When it comes to mountaintop removal and coal sludge, there is no responsible course but to ban them entirely. Mountaintop removal is the practice of demolishing Appalachian peaks, in order to scrape out their coal seams. It fills neighboring valleys and streams with the resultant rubble, and damages the health of nearby communities. Coal sludge is the liquid byproduct of washing coal in a carcinogenic chemical bath to remove impurities, such as heavy metals including arsenic, mercury, lead, and others. We call for the abolition of both.

These two practices meet at Massey’s Brushy Fork sludge impoundment on Coal River Mountain.

The Brushy Fork Coal Sludge Impoundment is the tallest earthen dam in the Western Hemisphere, permitted to hold 9 billion gallons of sludge. Massey’s “sunny day” casualty estimation is that if the dam were to break, the flood would kill 998 Coal River Valley residents.

Coal sludge impoundments have failed in the past. A Massey-operated sludge impoundment in Martin County, KY broke in 2000, spilling 306 million gallons of toxic sludge into the tributaries of the Tug Fork, Big Sandy, and Ohio Rivers, killing wildlife, and contaminating 27,000 people’s drinking water. Brushy Fork sits above a honeycomb of abandoned underground room and pillar mines in which 31 pillars are of insufficient strength to reliably support the mine roof, let alone the mass of 9 billion gallons of sludge. Brushy Fork could also break through bottom failure, causing sludge to gush from abandoned mine entrances into the surrounding, populated valleys.

The peril of Brushy Fork is compounded by Massey’s mountaintop removal operations on the Bee Tree Permit, which surrounds the impoundment. Each day, Massey blasts within hundreds of yards of the impoundment. Every mine blast sends high and low frequency vibrations into the mountain. High frequency vibrations are the visible blast, launching fly rock and dust, and dissipate over a short distance. Low frequency vibrations, however, cause structural damages, often foundation cracks, miles from the blast site. Brushy Fork’s earthen dam structure is within hundreds of yards of blasting operations. Thousands of lives are at risk.

Massey must be stopped—that is why we are putting ourselves on the line today.

Shareholders – you have the power to intervene. Use your institutional power to demand Massey cease its mountaintop removal operations and production of coal slurry. Responsibly decommission the Brushy Fork Impoundment. Also, we ask that you join with the coalition of nine public institutional investors that are asking Massey to withhold support from Don Blankenship and Board of Directors Baxter F. Philips, Richard M. Gabrys, and Dan R. Moore “because they have failed to carry out their duties on the Safety, Environmental, and Public Policy Committee.”

Americans – coal from the mountains of Appalachia is burned all over the United States. It heats our homes, powers our factories, and illuminates our schools and offices. It is sometimes difficult connect one’s energy consumption to a struggle hundreds of miles away, but we urge you to take responsibility for that power and stand in solidarity with the people of Appalachia. We know that not everyone is able to put themselves at risk, but we firmly believe that all Americans can–and must– stand up and say: Massey Energy, Stop Putting Profits Before People!

Signed,
People of the Earth and Appalachia

# # #

For more information on mountaintop removal coal mining and Massey Energy, please see http://dcrisingtide.blogspot.com/

Filed under: Act Locally, Climate Justice, Coal, Corporate Responsibility, Direct Action, global warming, Impacted Communities, mountain top removal

From Rev. Billy’s folks in NYC: Hidden-cam, an inspirational video showing a Chase bank customer closing her account, and explaining mountaintop removal to several Chase reps.

The Chase employees in this video are clearly troubled by the news that their “conscious” and “sustainability minded” company blows up mountains to pay their salary. We imagine their are many more like them inside Chase.

More than a dozen more members of the flock will be closing their accounts this week.

Filed under: Act Locally, Coal, Coal Campaign, Direct Action, Dirty Energy, global warming, mountain top removal

Friday May 14, Nationwide

Once again the fossil fuel industry has brought crisis to the Gulf Coast. Devastation of untold proportions spews non-stop from BP’s oil well as politicians try to save face with empty promises, and oil companies preserve their profits with PR campaigns. This catastrophic spill comes on the heels of Obama’s plan to expand offshore drilling. The price of burning fossil fuels is too high. From combustion to extraction the oil industry poisons our communities, destroys ecosystems, and destabilizes the climate. Now is the time to stop offshore drilling dead in its tracks and drive another nail into the fossil fuel industry’s coffin.

Take action Friday May 14 to demand:

-An immediate ban on all offshore drilling

-A rapid and just transition away from fossil fuels

-No bailouts for the oil industry. All recovery costs must be paid for by BP, Halliburton, Transocean and other implicated companies.

-The federal government must remove any caps on liability for oil companies.

-BP provides full compensation for impacted communities and small businesses.

-BP provides full funding for long-term ecosystem restoration for impacted areas.

-Oil companies operating in the Gulf fully fund restoration of coastal ecosystems damaged by canals, pipelines, and other industry activities.

Take action at:

-BP gas stations and offices

-Halliburton and Transocean offices

-Federal buildings

-Offices of members of Congress

-State government officials in states affected by Obama’s offshore drilling proposal.

-Critical Mass bike rides

-Vigils to mourn the unspeakable loss brought by this spill

-Get creative!

Endorsing Organisations:

The Yes Men, Climate SOS, Rainforest Action Network, Rising Tide North America, Institute for Social Ecology, Eastside Fellowship of Reconciliation, Biofuelwatch, Codepink Women for Peace, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, Earth First!.

www.risingtidenorthamerica.org

endorse the day of action by emailing:

oilspill@risingtidenorthamerica.org

Filed under: Act Locally, Climate Justice, Direct Action, Extraction, global warming, Oceans, Oil

2007 Convergence for Climate Action at proposed Bradwood LNG site. The weeklong event, organized by Rising Tide with local communities was a critical moment for movement building.

By Nick Engelfried & Monica Vaughan.

After a five yearlong organizing effort by a diverse and passionate coalition of Oregonians and Southern Washingtonians, the grassroots No LNG coalition triumphed over Bradwood LNG.

Monday afternoon, the fight for the Pacific Northwest’s clean energy future achieved a long-awaited major milestone: the backer of the proposed Bradwood Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) Terminal announced suspension of their application for the project.  This renders Bradwood LNG essentially dead.  In a part of the country where there are new coal plants proposed (and where such projects are unlikely to be proposed anytime soon) LNG represents the cutting edge of the fossil fuel industry’s expansion.  Bradwood LNG’s defeat is a victory that should send a warning to fossil fuel projects across the region.

At word of the news, community members wept with joy and phones rang continuously to share the news. At a press conference, coalition members reflected on the complex and significant meaning of such a victory over the fossil fuel industry. As community leader and dedicated volunteer Cheryl Johnson put it, “They have money, but we have heart. In the end, heart always wins”.

It would be impossible to do justice in a single blog post to the groundswell of grassroots activism that led to this clean energy victory.  Throughout the past several years, environmentalists and land-rights activists across Oregon have rallied in opposition to proposed LNG terminals and pipelines – not just Bradwood LNG, but two other import terminals and the network of LNG pipelines that would connect import centers to existing pipelines, sending gas shipped in from Russia, Peru, or the Middle East down to the California market.

Students meet with farmer on 150 year old family farm threatened by pipeline development as part of the second Bike the Pipe event.

Oregon farmers have challenged the LNG industry’s attempts to seize private land; Columbia Riverkeeper and the Nez Pierce tribe fought a fierce legal battle, college students have heavily lobbied state representatives and organized bike-ride protests, Rising Tide organized acts of civil disobedience and other movement-building actions, and hundreds of Oregonians have rallied multiple times at the capitol to demand a future free of LNG.

Now we’re clearly winning, but the fight’s not yet over.  Oregon still faces two other proposed LNG terminals and their associated pipelines.  One terminal would be located on the Columbia River, and the other at Coos Bay.  The remarkable coalition that defeated Bradwood will continue to fight these remaining LNG projects.

Later this month, the NO LNG coalition will be leveraging the power of this victory at the Rally at the NW Natural Shareholder Meeting (backer of the Palomar pipeline) to demand an end to LNG investments once and for all.

And speaking of investments, it seems Bradwood LNG didn’t make such a good one for the project’s backer, Texas-based NorthernStar Natural Gas.  Shortly after Bradwood’s suspension became official, NorthernStar announced it is filing for bankruptcy.  The company reportedly threw away around $100 million on the Bradwood LNG Terminal, and another proposed LNG terminal in California (which recently died a much-deserved death as well).  The company’s hedge-fund investment gone bankrupt, has left a trail of unpaid debt across the state. Leaving unpaid bills to lawyers, consultants, and even an unpaid $186,000 bill owed to Clatsop County.

Though market factors also contributed to Bradwood’s demise, grassroots activism in Oregon can truly be said to have sent this multi-million dollar project packing.  The opening of new reserves of natural gas in North America during the last few years helped put the nails in Bradwood’s coffin.  But, without organized grassroots opposition, the terminal likely would have begun construction years ago.

This week, grassroots activism in Oregon triumphed over one of the most well funded industrial projects in this state’s history.  Let’s hope this marks the beginning of the end for Northwest LNG.

We hope this is a victory can resonate with and inspire all grassroots movements against fossil fuel infrastructure!

Filed under: Act Locally, Climate Justice, Economics, global warming, Impacted Communities, LNG, Natural Gas, Victories

We can’t make up shit better than this.  In all the excitement around the new Arizona apartheid laws, the creeps in the right wing media and blogosphere have gone off their happy pills once again.

Rush Limbaugh, known as “The Great One” amongst the racist homophobic tea bagger cadres, came out on Monday and proclaimed that eco-terrorists must have caused BP’s oil rig spill.

“Now, lest we forget, ladies and gentlemen, the carbon tax bill, cap and trade that was scheduled to be announced on Earth Day. I remember that. And then it was postponed for a couple of days later after Earth Day, and then of course immigration has now moved in front of it. But this bill, the cap-and-trade bill, was strongly criticized by hardcore environmentalist wackos because it supposedly allowed more offshore drilling and nuclear plants, nuclear plant investment. So, since they’re sending SWAT teams down there, folks, since they’re sending SWAT teams to inspect the other rigs, what better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig?  I’m just noting the timing here.

“From The Hill, about the Senate bill: “Sierra Club chief Michael Brune told The Hill’s E2 Wire: ‘We will go to the mat for defending Clean Air Act authority.’  Brune also pointed to another potential stumbling block: offshore drilling. ‘We will not be able to accept the dramatic giveaway that offshore oil drilling represents,’ he said.”  The five hurdles the climate bill must clear, and one of them is offshore drilling.  That’s in TheHill.com.

Wow.  You’d think stories like this would be sent off to Fox’s writers at “24” and not their news desk.  But, “The Great One’s” idle speculation fueled a wildfire of hysterics about lurking environmentalists with dark motives for the Gulf Coast’s wildlife and the oil industry’s less than squeaky clean reputation.  Teabagger bloggers, Fox News chuckleheads and at least one former Bush official joined the chorus exposing the black helicopters manned by the Sierra club’s special forces plot.

In a moment of classic irony, Rush received a ringing endorsement from former FEMA director Michael “Heck of a job, Brownie,” Brown.   Of course, Brown is one of the people most responsible for the last disaster to hit Louisiana.  “I think it’s a possibility clearly… This plays right into the real policy of this administration, which is ‘we hate big oil, we hate off-shore drilling and now we have an excuse not to do it.”

Hey Brownie, just a quick FYI for you, Obama has been and continues to support offshore drilling.  Why don’t you go back under your rock and check your facts?

And it’s not just about the conspiracy fires being fanned by the right wing nutters but the more mainstream folks making this an easier atmosphere for belief in the eco-terror boogey man.  Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has regularly framed this tragedy as “a threat to our way of life,” comparing the ecological disaster to “terrorism” and a threat to “freedom, safety and security.”  Sounds like Gov. Jindal is trying to avoid going the direction of his predecessor Gov. Blanco after her rather pitiful attempt at disaster relief during Katrina.  And there is not better way to look engaged than talk about terrorism, freedom and safety.  Americans lap that up like kitty’s milk.

GreenistheNewRed.com blogger Will Potter (the inspiration for this blog,) always keeping it real like a true Upton Sinclair muckraker, points out in “Did “Eco-Terrorists” Cause the Gulf Oil Spill?” that Limbaugh’s comments are merely a deflection from the real eco-terrorists- BP, Transocean and Halliburton, and from the bigger questions about the sustainability and safety of offshore drilling and the oil industry in general.  Potter notes that in true American fashion when the chips are down the right-wing, opportunist politicians and the corporations love them look for a scapegoat and lately shouting “terrorist” seems to resonate with the public.  

Then there are the real terrorists that the right wing media and the craven politicians are covering up for- British Petroleum (BP).  Greenpeace’s Mark Floegel reports from Louisiana today in “The Gulf of Oil” that BP is engaged in another form of deflection and diversion which is the benevolent oil company doing everything they can to save the Gulf Coast.

Talking with oil spill expert Rick Steiner, Floegel reports that BP is dusting off the playbook from the Exxon Valdez spill.  This playbook includes:

1. Understate the amount of oil spilled.
2. Understate the environmental damage caused by the oil.
3. Overstate the effectiveness of your company’s response.
4. Try to buy off the locals with tiny amounts of money (BP is offering $5,000 each to coastal residents in Mississippi) in exchange for waivers promising not to sue for damages.
5. Slap gag orders on anyone doing business with the corporation. (Fishermen who want work from BP in the cleanup efforts have to agree in writing not to speak to the media. The gag orders are legally meaningless; it’s the intimidation factor that counts.)

He also notes that BP is especially focusing on #3:”BP had a couple hundred shrimp boats on the gulf Wednesday, trolling booms back and forth. It’s not an oil spill response, it’s Response Theater.“

It’s outrageous that BP and the right wing noise machine are lessening, deflecting and diverting attention from the real problems associated with offshore drilling. Not only can these dogs can hunt, they are quickly becoming mainstream thought.  Our society and culture are composed of stories where meaning matters more than truth.  Our world is in a grave ecological and economic crisis, yet the power holders continue to prove to be the more persuasive story-tellers.

On May 14, Rising Tide North America and many other allies will be having a day of action to tell another side of the story.  More details soon.  Watch these blogs for how to get involved.

Filed under: Act Locally, Extraction, global warming, Oceans, Oil