Historical Image of the Day

Coal mining, near Richlands, Virginia, 1974.

I had originally intended this series of images to last a week or so, but with the sporadic posting, I've kind of kept it going. I'll close it here. This set of images I've used recently comes from the Environmental Protection Agency's amazing Documerica program. Between 1971 and 1977 (though mostly in 73 and 74), the EPA hired photographers to document environmental degradation, work conditions, and everyday life around the nation. You can check out the whole collection here, which I highly recommend.

Historical Image of the Day

Opposition to coal strip mining, Hendrysburg, Ohio, 1973

Coal Mining Comics

Ethan Persoff uncovers yet another amazing comic book of the past, with this pro-coal mining comic from the 1960s.

I don't know that this matches the George Wallace comic book from 1962, but it's pretty great nonetheless.

Historical Image of the Day

Child labor in a coal mine, Pittston, Pa, 1911

Historical Image of the Day

Farmington Mine Disaster, West Virginia, 1968

Historical Image of the Day

This week's images concern the history of mining in America.

Coal mine rescue party, West Virginia, 1918

Vetoing Mountaintop Removal Permit

In another example of the game "Elections Have Consequences," the Environmental Protection Agency is likely to veto a previously approved mountaintop removal coal mining project in West Virginia. This project would have been the largest single mountaintop removal operation in history.

Of course, any reasonable application of existing environmental legislation should make these operations illegal. When the mountain is blown up and disposed of in the valleys below, it destroys the water, thus violating the Clean Water Act. Finally, the EPA is moving to enforce the regulations.

Now, this hardly means the end of mountaintop removal, but at least an emboldened EPA will at least halt the most egregious coal operations. 

Coal and Clean Water

What's the coal industry been up to in the last weeks while I've been gone?

Pure evil it turns out!

In fact, their continued destruction of West Virginia water supplies by pouring coal slurry into underground mines has forced towns to find new sources of water. Luckily, the town of Prenter has secured the funding for a new water line.

The Second Battle of Blair Mountain

In August 1921, during southern West Virginia's coal wars, a pitched battle took place at Blair Mountain. Probably 100 people died, mostly on the miner's side, during the next week. This important event in American labor history has been almost totally forgotten about.

That is, until the West Virginia Division of Culture and History decided to name the site to the National Register of Historic Places. Governor Joe Manchin, while trying to ride the fence, clearly supports this action. Why are they doing it? A couple of reasons. First, there is the potential for mountaintop removal coal mining in the area. Placing the site on the National Register would make stripping that land more difficult. Second, I think there is still significant resistance within the coal companies and their lackeys that rule West Virginia to remembering this important event that is only the largest armed uprising in American history since the Civil War.

I've talked many times before of the hell of mountaintop removal. That the UMWA supports it is a travesty--it is a job destroying, community destroying, environment destroying way of mining coal. But with relatively weak leadership by UMWA president Cecil Roberts, it's hardly surprising that the coal miners are caving on this issue. Maybe it'll take destroying a historically important area to get a little public attention to the issue. That it's the site of a labor struggle makes me skeptical, but Huffington Post is now on the story, so that's a good start. And as with all things coal, Ken Ward is all over it.

Here's Your Clean Coal For You

Clean coal.

What a joke. Not only is it an environmental oxymoron, but it contains the blood of workers.

Ken Ward tells the story of Bud Morris, a Kentucky coal miner killed in 2005. He was hit by an underground coal car, losing one leg and having the other crushed. He might have survived. But he was denied even the most basic medical care. He went for nearly an hour without medical treatment, basically bleeding to death in the mine.

Morris' death led to new legislation in Kentucky requiring at least 2 medical technicians in a mine at any time. Of course, the coal companies are fighting that legislation, trying to reduce the number to 1 in small mines.

If it's coal, you know it's evil.

Historical Image of the Day

Coal miners emerging from a shift. Harlan County, Kentucky, 1946

The Opportunities Blogging Brings!

For instance, I could become a hack for the coal industry!

Brad Johnson at Grist reports that the coal industry is looking for bloggers of their own to promote so-called "clean coal," if by clean you mean millions of gallons of coal ash polluting Tennessee rivers and forcing people out of their homes.

You can get into the debate. If you are interested in becoming an active member of ABEC's Blogger Brigade just send me an e-mail to abroadhurst@balancedenergy.org and let me know you're interested. One of our team members will give you a call and walk you through the process. It's really easy -- and for those of you who don't already Blog, it is fun! You can join the online debate that's already going on and you and others can remain anonymous (if you want to) at the same time! We'll even set up a little competition to see how many Blog entries each person can make.

Awesome!

They also have a Facebook page and a Twitter feed.

So come on boys and girls, let's all be hacks for America's most vile industry! It'll be super duper rad!

Merry Christmas--From the Coal Industry!

Oh coal. What wonderful things don't you give Appalachia?

An estimated 500 million gallons of coal-ash sludge are seeping along the I-40 Knoxville-Nashville corridor in eastern Tennessee, after an earthen wall gave way on Dec. 22 at the TVA Harriman coal-fired plant. While no casualties were reported, the coal-ash spill -- the refuse left over after the plant burns the coal -- should be a terrifying toxic wake-up call about the thousands of coal-fired plants and refuse-pile accidents waiting to happen across the county.

I again state that for all the evil industries in the world (timber and oil, I'm looking at you), coal might be the most diabolical. Destroying our mountains. Changing our climate. Dumping coal ash in our rivers and soil. Awesome.

It'd also be nice if TVA actually cared about these problems or were at all accountable to the public. TVA may be the worst of the New Deal agencies and turning it into a corporation did not help matters.

More on Mountaintop Removal

Just want to recommend Sarah Kuck's piece on the evils of mountaintop removal coal mining.

I've stressed this before, but mountaintop removal might be the single most evil thing in this country right now. I know there's a lot of evil out there. But we are creating geological change, environmental suicide, and social destruction through this hideous, reprehensible practice.

Good for Bank of America

The Natural Resources Defense Council may have struck upon one of the best ways to fight mountaintop removal coal mining: make it socially unacceptable.

After taking Bank of American executives on a helicopter tour of mountaintop removal sites, the NRDC convinced the bank to stop funding such projects. In an atmosphere where Bush is implementing all sorts of new rules allowing for mountaintop removal to expand and dump its soils into rivers and creeks around southern Appalachia, new, aggressive strategies are necessary. This is such a reprehensible practice and the only way it survives is because nobody sees the incredible damage to the landscape it causes. If you can take away the funding for these projects by exposing people in power to these hellish operations, you can go a long ways toward putting a stop to it.

Kudos to both the NRDC and Bank of America on this one.

Also, the coal company response is classic:

[A]s all the activists who so eloquently and passionately speak of the ills of coal and mountaintop mining get up in the morning, drink their hot coffee, eat some toast, blow dry their hair while watching the morning news, attend their meetings in a room with lights and warm heat and write to their representatives on laptops and computers while calling others on their charged cellphones, please remember who provides the electricity. It is provided by coal.

You could have used the exact same arguments to defend slavery. The clothes you wear, the jobs you have--all happen because of slavery. Yes, energy is needed, just as people to pick cotton was needed. But that doesn't mean you have to use inhuman or apocalyptic environmental methods to make it happen.

The Pathetic Local Justifications of Mountaintop Removal

Mountaintop removal is one of the greatest environmental travesties in the world today. It is almost without question the most severe environmental degradation issue the United States faces today. I have argued before that nobody cares much because it takes place in West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, a land filled with conservative poor white people that environmentalists neither know nor trust.

But in any case, the coal industry and their local stooges consistently pull out this refrain for justifying why mountaintop removal is good for the local community:

"A lot of people look at mountain top removal [mining] as a negative, but I see it as a positive. We need to stop apologizing for coal ... I want us to promote mountain top removal, because we need flat land. We can not have economic expansion without places to do things and part of mountain top removal is for places like hospitals, airports and different type of merchants."

Lieutenant Governor Daniel Mongiardo, Kentucky. Via Grist.

I have seen this exact same refrain before in other places, particularly local West Virginia and Kentucky newspapers. It is utterly absurd to anyone who knows the area. Flattening mountains will never bring economic prosperity to southern Appalachia. Big business is simply not going to move there. Unless they flatten the whole region, the roads are too narrow and the area is too far away from major cities to make sense as an industrial hub. The citizens, in no small part because of the rapacious coal companies, are among the poorest and least well-educated in the country. The jobs they want to compete for are already in the developing world, because no matter how much the coal industry tears apart Appalachia and no matter how desperate the citizens are for decent work, they are not going to be able to compete with the cheap labor of Mexico, Guatemala, Bangladesh, and 50 other nations across the world.

I also don't think that the coal companies and local elites who make these arguments really believe other businesses will move into the region either. They claim these benefits to justify the incredible environmental and economic damage they are doing to Appalachia. By giving people false hope for a better future, they undermine the legitimate criticism they get from local citizens groups and those few people in other parts of the country who care about what is happening there.

Coal companies are the single most evil entity in the United States. I firmly believe this.

Historical Image of the Day

Pittsburgh coal mine, 1931

Mine Safety

The near-certain deaths of the Utah miners plus the deaths of the 3 construction workers at the Indiana mine last week reminds us that coal mining is about the worst profession in the world. China has become one of the world's leading producers and far and away the world's leader in worker fatalities. Mike Hall at the AFL-CIO blog notes that concerns about the safety at the Utah mine were raised five months ago. Why were they not taken care of? Probably because owners have virtually no incentive to keep up safety conditions under the Bush administration. Bush has cuddled with the coal industry from day one. In a time when we should be eliminating coal from our energy supplies, Bush has pushed for increased production. This despite the clear connections between coal and climate change.



Many decades ago, United Mine Workers president John L. Lewis remarked that in an ideal world, no one would have to make their living mining coal. It's a terrible job and has been for centuries. We could prevent any more workers from dying underground if we cared at all to find alternative energy sources. Yet we don't and no doubt more American workers will die soon as a result.

Historical Image of the Day

Utah coal miner and daughter. I'm not sure of the date but I think it's from the 1930s.

Thanks to Dave Noon for sending me this. All submissions are quite welcome as I don't want to do any work for myself.