Look over there on the right of your screen (now you have to scroll to the top), you'll see a little box from ilovemountains.org that you can use to find out if your electricity comes from coal mined using mountaintop removal. This is a technique of totally annihilating mountains to get to the coal, as written about here before.
"ilovemountains.org" is one of the many important organizations fighting against mountaintop removal mining. It is not an easy fight, especially as most people pay no attention whatsoever where their electricity comes from (unlike oil) as long as it is there. People are horrified, outraged, and focused on the enormous social, environmental, and, of course, economic costs of pumping oil out of the Middle East, but few outside of the region bother to be concerned about the total and permanent devastation of the Appalachian landscape. Yet our electricity comes from it. You'll be surprised to see how much of your electricity comes from it as well. This computer I am writing is powered by coal from mountaintop removal mines. Blood on our hands.
The amount of coal they are pulling out of the fields in West Virginia, Virginia, and Kentucky has been increasingly hugely, and there has been a corresponding increase in the number of mountains destroyed forever.
Around here, the ships are stacking up waiting to come into Hampton Roads to load the coal to fuel cheap electricity in Europe:
"ilovemountains.org" is one of the many important organizations fighting against mountaintop removal mining. It is not an easy fight, especially as most people pay no attention whatsoever where their electricity comes from (unlike oil) as long as it is there. People are horrified, outraged, and focused on the enormous social, environmental, and, of course, economic costs of pumping oil out of the Middle East, but few outside of the region bother to be concerned about the total and permanent devastation of the Appalachian landscape. Yet our electricity comes from it. You'll be surprised to see how much of your electricity comes from it as well. This computer I am writing is powered by coal from mountaintop removal mines. Blood on our hands.
The amount of coal they are pulling out of the fields in West Virginia, Virginia, and Kentucky has been increasingly hugely, and there has been a corresponding increase in the number of mountains destroyed forever.
Around here, the ships are stacking up waiting to come into Hampton Roads to load the coal to fuel cheap electricity in Europe:
"Coal slumped badly earlier this decade, but now King Coal is coming back.
Coal dumpings at the region's three terminals will likely hit 42 million tons this year, as opposed to the 28 million tons they shipped in 2007, Host estimated. Through August, coal shipments are up 39 percent in 2008 compared with 2007, he said.
Norfolk Southern Corp.'s Pier 6 at Lambert's Point in Norfolk is the region's largest terminal. Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP's Pier IX and Dominion Terminal Associates, both in Newport News, are smaller and are served by the railroad CSX Transportation.
While much of the coal exported from Hampton Roads is metallurgical, or coking, coal used to make steel, both Newport News terminals are shipping more steam coal, used to produce electricity, to Europe, Host said.
The coal vessel backup, which began last month, shows how U.S. supply is struggling to keep up with surging international demand, said Mark Bower, assistant vice president of export and metallurgical coal marketing for Norfolk Southern.
A weak U.S. dollar, growing consumption by China and India, cutbacks by other exporters and rising shipping rates, among other factors, are contributing to the renaissance of U.S. coal exports, he said."
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