Pulling the Plug on Mountaintop Removal Health Research

The saying goes that coal keeps the lights on, but in at least this case the lights are going out. Apparently without much fanfare, the Obama administration pulled the plug on a research project being conducted by the USGS that had been looking into the health effects from mountaintop removal.

            In February of last year the USGS Energy Resources Program discontinued the funding for a study of the air quality in Artie, West Virginia, a very small community that has the misfortune to be surrounded by mountaintop removal mines. You can see Artie pinpointed below in the Google map. The expansive blotches across the landscape are the mountaintop mines.

The study is in its second year and had already resulted in some better understanding of how these large mines hurt the air quality around them and subsequently hurt the health of nearby residents. Folks who live close to mountaintop mining have higher rates of respiratory diseases, including lung cancer.

            The team working on this research has been told that they will be investigating health concerns over fracking. As all agencies have to prioritize their activities around limited budgets, this shift might be seen as a wise move, as fracking, being widespread across the country, has the potential to affect a lot more people than those living in Appalachia around mountaintop removal operations.

            But some folks think that politics may have played a part in the scientific switcheroo, among them Michael Hendryx. Hendryx is a former West Virginia University researcher who has more than two dozen peer-reviewed papers published that establish a link between mountaintop removal and poor health.

            Is this politics or prioritizing? The USGS is continuing other research on MTR, so I really can’t say. I just know it’s a shame that funding gets pulled on needed research, no matter what the reason might be. On the other hand, the science that has been done so far shows mountaintop removal to be harmful to salamanders, fish, people, and other creatures that live in the mountains. We know enough already to see that it should go on no longer.

Testing the Waters in West Virginia

Well, well, well. Maybe I should figure better late than never, but that is small consolation when your drinking water has smelled like licorice and made you nauseated and gave you headaches for weeks.

            The National Institute of Health, specifically the National Toxicology Program at the NIH, announced that they will conduct extensive tests on the health effects of 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, the coal cleaning substance that spilled into the Elk River in West Virginia back in January and poisoned the drinking water for 300,000 residents.

            I’m glad that the NIH is doing its job, but it is unsettling that this announcement comes six months after the Elk River spill. It’s actually unsettling that MCHM, which has been used by the coal industry for decades, hadn’t been tested long ago.

The glass is half full and long overdue to be tested for toxicity

Matt Wasson Tells Washington About Mountaintop Removal, Science, and Ill Health

Today on Capitol Hill the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on Environment and the Economy held hearings. The hearing was titled “Modernizing the Business of Environmental Regulation and Protection.”

            Persons testifying at the included a number of state regulators who explained programs and efforts to hasten the pace of the regulatory process. Perhaps to shed some light on the reality that for folks living in Appalachia there exists scant regulation when it comes to mountaintop removal Representative John Yarmuth (D-KY) brought in Matt Wasson, the Director of Programs for Appalachian Voices, to testify as to the large body of science that links mountaintop mining to the poor health of Appalachians living in proximity to the mines. Here is a short video of Wasson’s testimony:

Yarmuth is the author of the Appalachian Communities Health Emergency Act (H.R. 526), which would halt mountaintop removal until it is determined to be safe by the Director of Health and Human Services. The science is there, but I doubt if there is any way his bill could get through Congress. If you want to see the whole hearing, it is here in a hyperlink sort of way.

Fasting and Frustrations In the Mountains of West Virginia

There’s been a lot going on in the hills of Appalachia in the last week or so. Unfortunately for me, I’ve been busy with other work and writing. So here is a brief rundown of what’s been happening in the mountains.

For the last two weeks, actually a bit longer, 16 days total now, Roland Micklem, a retired science teacher who is now 85 years old, has been conducting a fast at the West Virginia state capitol building to inspire awareness of climate change, which includes mountaintop removal mining. He has fought for the mountains and the people of Appalachia for some time. In 2009 he organized a walk of senior citizens in West Virginia to protest mountaintop mining. He says his environmental awareness goes back to the 1950s, when he noticed that some of his favorite birds and animals were disappearing from his native Virginia.

Micklem has been joined by two other activists, Vincent Eirene and Mike Roselle. Here is a short video of Micklem from a couple days ago as he explains his motivations:

You can keep up with Micklem’s efforts through a Facebook page that follows the fast.

And I thought this was very interesting. Over at Coal Tattoo, the excellent blog about all things coal, Ken Ward points out the blatant subservience Senator Joe Manchin has to all things coal, as he held a stakeholder meeting to discuss the EPA’s new rule on emissions from existing power plants and to “find a balance between economic and environmental concerns.” As Ward point out this “balance” is a sort of Fox News type of balance that only included the interests of the fossil fuel companies. No one from any environmental organization or agency was invited to this stakeholder meeting.

            For blog posts, I only rarely read any of the comments, but please read the comment from Bo Webb on this post. Webb is of course the man who, in hopes of finding a simple rural life, returned to West Virginia only to find his homeland ravaged and his neighbors sickened by mountaintop mining. The story of his growing awareness and activism makes up part of the documentary On Coal River. In his comment Webb recounts his absurd meeting with Manchin as an environmental stakeholder in the state of West Virginia. I don't believe that Manchin could have sent a clearer message to Webb that the Senator did not care one fig about Webb, his community, or his mountains.

            

A Great Day For the People of Appalachia

This is a great day for the mountains. Actually, the great day was yesterday, but I’m just getting around to blogging today, but it’s still a great day. Anyway, yesterday a panel from the US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the EPA is within its authority to set up a process, in coordination with the Army Corps of Engineers, to review Clean Water Act permits for mining operations.

            Ever since the enactment of the Clean Water Act, which requires permitting for dumping or dredging in the waterways of this country, it has fallen to the Army Corps of Engineers to issue those permits. Having the Corps perform this function made sense, as this agency has been building dams, canals, and flood control structures.

            Since taking office in 2009 and in an effort to mitigate the pollution and destruction that is the legacy of mountaintop mining, the Obama administration has been involving the EPA in the review process for mountaintop mining permits. The court’s ruling, which came from a three-judge panel, invalidated lower court decisions by U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton that sided with the mining companies who claimed that the EPA was overstepping its authority in working with the Corp on permitting for the mines. Yesterday’s decision sends the case back to U.S. District Court.

Thank you, Mr. President for improving the lives of Appalachians

As more and more science indicates that mountaintop removal is bad for people’s health (see here, here, and here) and is bad for the environment (see here, here, here, here, here, and here), it only makes sense that the EPA should take part in permitting for the mines. And if you’ve ever seen the destruction caused by these mines, you wonder why the EPA hasn’t been part of the process all along.

Concerned Citizens Or NIMBYs?

I’m not sure what to think of this latest development in West Virginia mining. In perhaps what might be called a fit of NIMBY, opposition has formed to a mountaintop mine operation going in right next to the Kanawha State Forest, which is about five to ten miles from the state capitol Charleston. Almost 200 concerned residents met at a local church on Tuesday to discuss ways they could have the permit for the planned mine rescinded.

Where the mine is planned next to the state forest. Image Tye Ward The Charleston Gazette

Officially designated as a state forest, the 9,300 acres of land are nonetheless managed as and considered by local residents to be a public park. People camp, hike, hunt, and fish there. While a company called Keystone Development has been mining an area east of the forest, the permit would allow an expansion of that mine into a mountaintop removal operation. Originally, the mountaintop mine would have come to within 100 feet of the forest and would have filled in an adjacent valley with mining debris, but Keystone scaled back some of the mining footprint and changed plans for the debris to possibly be dumped at another mining site.

While preserving the beauty and pleasure of a park is fully understandable, mountaintop mining is harmful wherever it happens. I don’t mean to jump allover these people, who certainly have a legitimate concern, but where were have they been as hundreds of mines have flattened the rest of their state? Did they show up at other churches as their fellow West Virginians were diagnosed with bladder cancer caused by mountaintop mining? Did they want to rescind permits to mines that would cause expectant mothers to give birth to babies with birth defects?

Freedom Industries and Teensy-Weensy Justice For Southern West Virginia

Justice has come to the people of southern West Virginia. Freedom Industries, which poisoned the drinking water of 300,000 West Virginia residents, has had a fine leveled against it by the federal government for the improper storage and infrastructure violations that caused the toxic spill.

            So—after spilling thousands of gallons of  4-Methylcyclohexane Methanol into the Elk River and poisoning the drinking water for 300,000 West Virginians, sickening many of them, inconveniencing most of them by forcing them to buy bottled water, adversely affecting business for bars, restaurants, and other establishments, and forcing the closing of dozens of schools—how much was the fine?

            $11,000.

            That’s right, Freedom Industries, after poisoning the drinking water of 300,000 individuals, paid out $11,000 dollars. That comes out to about three and a half cents per person.

            As I said, Justice has come to the people of southern West Virginia, only it is a very small and teensy-weensy amount of justice.

The glass is half full. It's just a teensy-weensy little glass.