One other thing I wanted to point out from the NYT piece on Bush's new mountaintop removal mining rule:
A spokesman for the National Mining Association, Luke Popovich, said that unless mine owners were allowed to dump mine waste in streams and valleys it would be impossible to operate in mountainous regions like West Virginia that hold some of the richest low-sulfur coal seams.
...
Even with the best techniques and most careful reclamation, surface or underground mining will always generate mountains of dirt and rock, he said.
"There's really no place to put the material except in the upper reaches of hollows," the [Interior Department] official said. "If you can't put anything in a stream, there's really no way to even underground mine."
Now, some folks might hear these sentiments and conclude, "well then, we can't mine for coal in the Appalachian mountains. We'll have to do without that coal."
That conclusion is never discussed, much less seriously considered. Everyone -- not just the Bush administration -- seems to take the continued operation of the coal industry in the Appalachians as the immutable starting point of the debate. If mining companies can get the coal without destroying the landscapes, cultures, and economies in which they operate, that's great. But if not, well, that's life.
Why, though? Can you imagine another industry that destroys land in order to sell a product that poisons people and threatens to make the earth uninhabitable not only being allowed to operate, but having its continued profit taken as a kind of national imperative? It's bizarre.
This is why I'm on a jihad against coal. Its present status among policymakers and the public goes beyond the canard of "cheap electricity" (itself a lie). Coal has a quasi-mythic hold on the American imagination.
It's time to take that myth on directly. Coal's free ride needs to end. If nothing else, I want to beat the drums enough to at least raise the question of whether we "must" mine for coal, so that in the next NYT article about MTR mining someone, at least, is quoted saying, "We've got to shut these fuckers down. It's not worth the damage." At least get the option on the table.
Copenhagen, U.S.A. December 7
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precipice Posted 8:54 am
25 Aug 2007
This is nuts. So, in the most practical terms, how can we put a halt to the coal insanity?
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GreyFlcn Posted 12:30 pm
25 Aug 2007
And the "Well because it's there we should use it" arguement doesn't hold much weight when you consider how many thousands times more renewable energy there is to be had.
http://greyfalcon.net/greenenergy.png
Even the energy independance arguement is a tad silly.
http://greyfalcon.net/dilbert2.png
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Biodiversivist Posted 12:35 pm
25 Aug 2007
Coal, the new melange.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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caniscandida Posted 6:54 pm
25 Aug 2007
Nevertheless, that one sole creation of his, the Guild Steersmen or Navigators, fascinates me. They are apparently a new species evolved from human origins, on account of constant high exposure to the spice, "melange," and need to remain in an environment of spice-gas. And even better, their hallucinatory "prescience," never explained, enables them to travel in space; and so they are responsible for all space-travel in the "Dune" universe.
Unfortunately, Herbert is otherwise not a story-teller of the most recommendable sort ...
And I am afraid, BioD, that I cannot quite see how "coal is the new melange."
Or do you mean, we believe, falsely, unwholesomely, destructively, that coal is the substance that is necessary for our survival, and the survival of our society, and so we must do everything we can to ensure that we always have it and use it? OK, that, I get.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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Its GEtting Hot in Here Posted 1:37 am
26 Aug 2007
Harry Reid Says No New Coal
http://itsgettinghotinhere.org/2007/08/19/harry-reid-says ...
Check out dispatches from the youth climate movement: http://www.itsgettinghotinhere.org/
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Sage Posted 2:06 am
26 Aug 2007
That's why it's treated as so important that the mining industry continues. Its demise means putting tens of thousands of people on the streets. If you want coal mining to be treated with less deference, your interests would be better served by pushing to diversify the economies of places in coal-rich areas. More people working outside the mines means less resistance to ending coal use.
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GreyFlcn Posted 4:18 am
26 Aug 2007
A similarly related jobs versus subsidy issue:
Doesn't Ethanol Usage Create Jobs and Provide Cash for Midwestern Communities?
Of course it does. But how are jobs created? If we mandated that everyone had to consume a pound of potatoes or a pineapple each week, it would also create jobs and revitalize communities. So why don't we do this?
We don't do this because the jobs are created by flowing money out of one region of the country into another. If job creation had no impact on jobs in other regions, we could just enact one mandate after another, forcing us to buy various products until everyone was happily employed. But the economy doesn't work that way. The jobs that are created in Iowa are a result of money flowing out of the rest of the country.
Paul Rogers, a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News, gives the following account in which he asked Iowa governor Tom Vilsack why the rest of the country should be forced to use ethanol:
"Because it helps farmers from my state expand their markets, Vilsack explained. 'So I guess you'd support a new federal law to require everybody in Des Moines to buy a computer, to help people in Silicon Valley expand their markets?' I asked. He didn't concur."
That's a pretty good example of why job creation isn't free. Forcing people in Iowa to buy computers would result in less money to spend on other things. It is just less obvious with ethanol, because the money is extracted in smaller increments.
http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2007/08/ethanolalternativ ...
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GreenEngineer Posted 2:25 am
27 Aug 2007
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