Reading some of the
posts to United For Coal’s Facebook page, I am sometimes flummoxed by the
amount of support that folks in Virginia, West Virginia, and Kentucky have for
the coal companies. Despite the great harm that these companies are doing to
the land and people of Appalachia, and despite of the inability or
unwillingness of the coal companies to economically benefit the communities of
Appalachia where coal is mined, many of the residents voice unwavering support
to Arch, Alpha, and other big coal companies.
True,
there are the three important things that the coal companies provide: jobs,
jobs, and jobs. But that still doesn’t explain the blind devotion that has
Appalachia residents supporting even some of the most egregious mining
practices like mountaintop removal.
Two
days ago, five persons associated with the Radical Action for Mountain Peoples'
Survival (RAMPS) protested the practice of mountaintop removal coal mining and
the building of gargantuan coal slurry impoundments by blocking the entrance
driveway to Alpha Natural Resources, a coal company that extracts coal through
mountaintop removal. The protesters chained large industrial equipment and
themselves to guard railing. They also placed a 250-gallon container of
nontoxic black colored water to symbolize the water held in slurry
impoundments. All the protesters were freed from the chains by police and
arrested. Traffic was restored to the driveway by 10:00 am.
Now,
looking at the reportage of the arrests by a local television station, it’s
easy to see the slant that favors the coal companies. Lindsey Price, the
journalist for WCYB in Bristol, Virginia, states in her news report:
The five protesters who were strung across the bridge were from
a group called Mountain Justice, a group who protests what they refer to as
'mountain top removal' mining.
“What they refer to”
designates a word or phrase not used in general parlance but is used by a
particular group, such as, “What Catholics refer to as a Holy Day of
Obligation.” or “What scientists refer to as a control group.” Some groups will
have terms like these to convey a connotation that they want to communicate to
the broader populace, such as when the tea party refers to the estate tax as a
death tax. Estate tax sounds neutral; death tax sounds bad. You get the idea.
By
using this phrase and putting mountain top removal in quotation marks, Price
seems to indicate that it is some sort of value-laden bit of rhetoric. This is
wrong. The term mountaintop removal has been used by a wide range of folks for
years, from those who oppose it to those who favor it, to describe this
efficient but destructive mining practice. The term goes back at least to 1997,
when Penny Loeb wrote about mountaintop removal in her August 3, 1997 story
“Shear Madness” for US News and World Report.
Price
failed to mention that the action of civil disobedience by the individuals was
additionally to protest the building of coal slurry impoundments. I don’t know
why this aspect of the story was left out of her piece of journalism. Slurry
impoundments have failed in the past, flooding valleys with toxic slurry to
great ecological damage. People have died when coal slurry dams have failed.
With that in mind, near the town of Whitesville, federal regulators recently
approved the expansion of a slurry dam that would allow it to grow taller than
the Hoover Dam. To me, it is a serious omission to her news story.
Also
Price limits the narrative of the protest, the bigger picture of the conflict,
to one in which a the spokesperson for RAMPS, Emily Keppler makes a statement
about the water pollution or the health consequences due to mountaintop mining,
only to be answered by the vice president of Alpha, Ted Pile.
"This exact
action was to bring, symbolic of course, the impacts of mountain top coal
mining to the headquarters to the people who are causing it, but don't have to
suffer the consequences of it," said Mountain Justice supporter Emily
Keeppler.
Protesters filled a
barrel full of concrete, then put a pipe through it and connected themselves
all the way across the bridge with chains. When firefighters cut the protesters
free it left piles of concrete on the bridge. "They locked themselves to a
giant barrel of dirty water to symbolize how Alpha coal is locking Appalachian
to dirty water," said Keppler.
Pile told me last
year Alpha had a 99.7 percent compliance rate with the water, and they are
constantly monitored at the state and federal level. "We're also a
highly-regulated industry, probably one of the most regulated industries in the
country," said Pile.
The five protesters
were arrested, but Keppler says it was worth it because this protest was
personal for those who were arrested. "Their health is being compromised,
their communities are being compromised, so they're absolutely willing to risk
arrest in order to engage in non-violent action to stop this," said
Keppler.
Pile tells us they
have not received any complaints or science to prove there are health issues.
"Out of about 86 million tons of coal we expect to mine this year, only
22, tons come from the type of mining they're objecting to. That'll probably be
close to zero next year," said Pile.
This
boils the conflict down to a “he said, she said” scenario, in which the truth
of the matter—the science being done points to irreparable damage to
Appalachian waterways and dire health consequences for those who live in
proximity to mountaintop mining— is left out of the picture. Watching the video
that was broadcast for this story, the reporter gives a bit of an upper hand to
the coal company. After each statement by Keppler, Price begins the retorts by
the coal company vice president with “But Price said…” This gives the
impression that the vice president is correcting a misstatement or
misunderstanding by the RAMPS spokesperson.
So is this why there is so much support for the coal companies
in Appalachia? Folks there turn on their televisions and get new reports like
this one?
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