Join me in standing up for Mountain Heroes–add your photo to the petition.

Stand in Solidarity with Mountain Heroes

Join me today in standing in solidarity with Mountain Heroes — add your photo and words of support to the online photo petition hosted by our friends at Earthjustice.

The heroes fighting for the mountains they know and love are asking us to stand with them against mountaintop removal mining and for a better way forward by joining the Mountain Heroes petition.

Mountains & Wildlife Destroyed

As I stood with local activists in the Coal River Mountain Valley, they pointed to the nearest mountain ridge and explained that hidden just beyond it were vast expanses of destruction.

The rich forests and streams where my new friends grew up exploring, searching for ginseng, and fishing were gone–replaced with rubble that resembled a moonscape.

The forests and streams of central Appalachia are abundant with diverse plants and wildlife–bears, coyotes, foxes, owls, Wild Turkeys, salamanders, trout and colorful darters. But, coal companies are blasting vast mountain ranges and dumping the rubble into huge valleys, destroying forests and communities. Coal processing plants are spreading coal dust and endangering the lives of everyone living in the valleys below the massive toxic slurry ponds, built with earthen dams that have collapsed with deadly consequences.

Join the Struggle Against Mountaintop Removal

Seeing the contrast from rich wildlife habitat to wasteland while visiting the struggling communities kept poor by “King Coal” is unlike anything I’ve seen before or since. Yet, people fighting for their homes and mountains are undaunted. They continue the struggle against wealthy coal companies and their massive tools of destruction.

Show your solidarity with Mountain Heroes against mountaintop removal and for clean energy.

Standing on top of another decapitated mountain.

Last week I travelled to Charleston West Virginia to see mountaintop removal coal mining. I saw the scale of mining underway and was taken aback. No community should be forced to tolerate this amount of environmental destruction.

The mountain forests and streams of Appalachia are magical places, with some of the richest biodiversity in North America. In my hikes through these forests, I have been fascinated by dazzling array of salamanders, crayfish, mussels and other unique aquatic species. Much of this treasure is now at risk because of mountaintop removal (MTR) mining.

What Is Mountaintop Removal?

MTR involves the removal of coal seams by destroying the forest, soil and rocks laying above them. This differs from traditional mining, where miners get to the coal with underground methods and leave the vast majority of the mountain undisturbed. The enormous amount of waste from MTR – 16 tons of material is displaced for every ton of coal mined - is either placed back on the ridge or dumped into neighboring valleys in a process known as “valley fill.”  Valley fills have caused the destruction of nearly2,000 miles of streams in Appalachia.

Because the region’s thick, easy-to-reach seams of coal are running out, coal companies in Appalachia are abandoning traditional mining and rapidly expanding MTR operations. In this respect, MTR closely parallels the oil industry’s shift to the more environmentally destructive deepwater drilling in the face of disappearing onshore and shallow water reserves.

As this map shows, nearly 1.2 million acres, an area roughly the size of Delaware, has now been heavily mined in Appalachia in large part due to the explosion of MTR mining. Dozens of permit applications for additional large-scale MTR projects are pending before state and federal regulators.

It is sad enough to think so many children from West Virginia, Kentucky and Virginia could grow up without knowing the solace of a healthy mountain forest or without enjoying fishing in a vibrant mountain stream. But the consequences of MTR go beyond the loss of wildlife heritage.  Appalachian communities are now increasingly exposed to dangerous flooding as the forests that absorb and filter rainwater are removed.  Residents who live near mountaintop removal mine sites increasingly complain of orange and black tap water flowing from their faucets.  Meanwhile, a series of studies are emerging that suggest a disturbing connection between MTR and birth defects, cancer and other health problems.  

What You Can Do

Downhill from mountaintop removal, a lifeless stream

So how can everyday citizens help turn this situation around?  The first thing we can do is insist that the coal companies and state and federal agencies comply with environmental, health and safety laws.  Write to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson at this address and insist that she veto any pending applications for MTR projects until new rules are put in place to protect people and their environment and compliance with the Clean Water Act is achieved. In particular, Administrator Jackson should reinstate the rule protecting streams from “valley fills” that was arbitrarily revoked by the Bush Administration in 2002.

To become an effective advocate, it helps to become more informed.  To study up more on this issue, I recommend the documentary “The Last Mountain,” starring Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Goldman Prize winner Maria Gunnoe, and a host of other leading voices in the MTR fight.

Once you hear these voices and see the images, it will be hard to sit on the sidelines.

Great Outdoors America Week

Streams stocked with brook trout, forests with foraging bears and trees housing cerulean warblers add an interesting mix of wildlife to the George Washington National Forest. There are also lakes, rivers, valleys, mountains and plenty of opportunity for recreation and relaxation. But, all of this natural splendor could be corrupted by the natural gas drilling process known as fracking.

The U.S. Forest Service is proposing a ban on fracking in this great outdoor public space. Take action to protect brook trout and other wildlife from fracking in George Washington National Forest. Developing energy is important and necessary for our way of life, but so is protecting wildlife for future generations. Say no fracking way to fracking in public lands and wild places.

Research related to infants has found that mothers residing in coal mining areas are more likely to have a low birth weight infant. This study extends that research, showing that mountaintop mining areas are associated with elevated levels of birth defect prevalence rates.

Mining industry lawyers attacked the findings, noting the study failed to account for consanguinity, which is just a really long word for inbreeding. Interestingly, the online rebuttal by attorneys from Crowell & Moring mysteriously disappeared, but you can read it here. After the Charleston Gazette questioned the law firm about the missing post, a spokeswoman for the organization had this to say:

Photo credit: Vivian Stockman

Our website alert is not intended to reflect views of the National Mining Association, but is an attempt to identify certain potential weaknesses of the study in question. Consanguinity is one of a number of commonly addressed issues in studies of this type, regardless of geography. Scientists address this consideration regularly because it can matter to scientific conclusions, and do so regardless of locale. We did not raise this issue with particular reference to any region, and we did not mean to imply any such thing. That said, we apologize for any offense taken, as none was intended. We can appreciate the view that our alert may not have provided enough context to explain the scientific points we aimed to address, and so have removed it from our site.

Another spokeswoman for the National Mining Association also said her organization was not involved with the infamous web posting. As for what the potential fallout of all of this will be, your guess is as good as mining.

Mountaintop removal mining is a destructive technique for extracting coal that destroys mountains, forests, wildlife, water and the way of life for people who live near the operation. As the WVU study reveals, the process can also have a terrible impact on babies, the next generation of West Virginians who will see the Mountain State with fewer mountains, greater pollution and potentially more health problems.

H.R. 2018, the Dirty Water Act, could make mountaintop removal mining even dirtier by gutting the Clean Water Act. You can speak up for wildlife, water and future generations of Americans today. Click here to tell lawmakers to protect our future, our health and our precious natural resources from pollution.

Ten years later, the release of the film The Last Mountain brings to light similar haunting facts about the carnage and destruction inflicted on rural Appalachia, West Virginia happening today.  Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  joins in the fight alongside residents of the Coal River Valley in West Virginia, who endure earsplitting explosions, extreme flooding, raining boulders that tear through communities, toxic sludge and poisoned water wells, life threatening exposure to toxins, and devastating pre-mature deaths.  

Roughly half the electricity in the U.S. comes from burning coal—one-third of that coal comes from the Appalachian Mountains. Yet there is a vast amount of mis-education about coal.  In the film, we are shown a school full of young imperiled children attending an elementary school coated in silica dust just below an impoundment holding 2.8 billion gallons of sludge.  Classrooms are filled with cancer and autism clusters that clearly defy statistical logic.  I couldn’t help but think about the irony that just weeks ago fourth-grade curriculum materials developed by the American Coal Foundation were distributed to tens of thousands of teachers.  The materials included no mention of the adverse environmental or health impacts of coal, presenting an unfair and unbalanced picture for our children.

So while the fourth largest coal company continues to blow up mountain tops for coal, we not only have local communities enduring life-threatening exposure to toxins, but the coal industry is using the classroom as a forum to propagandize kids on behalf of their product leaving out critical implications?  

As the future of the Appalachian Mountains holds great potential to harvest wind energy as an alternative, children have a right to know the full story on electricity production via coal burning.  Environmental and energy-based lesson plans and curricula should present a fair and balanced viewpoint and prepare our children for a complex and possibly perilous set of future environmental realities.

Learn more and get involved in the movement to end mountain top removal. 

The Last Mountain opened last weekend in New York City and Washington, DC. See when this gripping documentary will be playing in a city near you.

Take action against mercury and air toxins from coal-fired power plants!

The 120 page report is dedicated to the men who lost their lives that day—April 5, 2010. But instead of just writing that sentiment in italics on the first page, the investigation panel included a beautiful collection of obituaries—one for each person who died complete with a color photograph of him.

Most of the pictures that the families chose to submit of their lost loved ones are shots taken outside. Two of the miners are pictured standing in water proudly holding fish they had just caught. Many of the brief write-ups about the individual men include words like “he loved the outdoors”, “hunting, fishing, and four-wheel riding”, “avid outdoorsman”, and “enjoyed fishing with his sons”.

These men seem to have loved the water and mountains around them – the very water and mountains that the main provider of jobs in their hometown is destroying through the coal mining industry. Not only is the work of a coal miner extremely dangerous (with an average of 2.7 deaths in every 10,000 American coal miners each year over the last decade), but it is destroying the health of the people living near the mines and the natural heritage that surrounds them.

A new documentary highlighting the colossal problems associated with coal mining as well as homegrown alternative energy solutions titled The Last Mountain is opening in selected theaters across the country this weekend. Take two minutes to watch the movie’s powerful trailer:

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Last Mountain is opening this weekend in New York City and Washington, DC. See when this gripping documentary will be playing in a city near you: http://thelastmountainmovie.com/theatres

Learn more about the movie and coal, kids and America’s classrooms.

Take action against mercury and air toxins from coal-fired power plants!

As we celebrate this important success and look forward to the growing strength of our conservation movement, we also remember how far we’ve come.

The goal of uniting hunters, anglers, gardeners, bird watchers, scientists, and families to speak together with one voice for conservation began as little more than a cartoonist’s dream 75 years ago.  Noted illustrator and conservationist Jay N. “Ding” Darling  used  his pen to highlight the need for diverse stakeholders to come together to protect wildlife for our children’s future, preserve our natural places, and ensure clean air and water for all.

The Conservation Interests Can Get What They Need If They Will Pull Together (Credit: The "Ding" Darling Wildlife Society; The University of Iowa)

Ding Darling’s cartoons and conservation ethic caught the attention of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who appointed him the head of the U.S. Biological Survey in 1934, the forerunner to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.  Darling understood that unity was politically powerful and that there was no nationwide constituency to support policies and funding for the conservation work that needed to be done.  Darling proclaimed, “It is hard to start a fire with one stick of wood!”

In 1936, after convincing President Roosevelt to invite over 2,000 hunters, anglers, and conservationists from across the country to attend the first North American Wildlife Conference in Washington, DC, Darling realized his dream of a federation promoting conservation interests, encouraging social diversity, and demanding action from Congress.  The National Wildlife Federation was formed and Ding Darling became the organization’s first President.

Three-quarters of a century later, the diversity and scope of our affiliate organizations remains central to the strength of the National Wildlife Federation.  It is hard to start a fire with one stick of wood, but as Ding Darling mused, [imagine] if you could ever get the firewood together in one pile.

Welcome West Virginia Rivers Coalition!

To learn more about the National Wildlife Federation’s affiliate network, please visit NWF.org.

A river flows through Ohiopyle State Park in Pennsylvania

Do you consider clean drinking water a given? I know that on most days, I turn on the tap without worry.

But across the globe and throughout the U.S, millions are without access to clean drinking water or are having to fight to keep their ground water safe.

Right now, people who live in the rolling hills above the Marcellus Shale deposit that stretches across West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York are finding out that their groundwater, farmland, communities and wild places are at risk from hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

Fracking is a wildly destructive method of extracting natural gas from shale that uses incredible volumes of water, consumes extreme amounts of energy and can leave toxic messes–including toxic groundwater.

Already a problem out west, fracking is moving east and gaining attention, in part due to the new documentary, Gasland, by a PA resident who explores the impacts of fracking across the country after being offered a lease for a company to do hydraulic fracturing on his land.

The threats to wildlife, wild places and people from fracking–a practice that has the potential to pollute huge quantities of water with toxic chemicals–are numerous and serious. NWF’s comments to the EPA on a proposed new study of fracking (pdf) highlighted one of many examples of the impacts that toxic fracking chemicals has had on waterways and wildlife:

On September 16, 2009, 8,000 gallons of fracking fluid leaked into Stevens Creek near Dimrock, Pennsylvania, causing minnows, salamanders and tadpoles to swim erratically and die. Nationwide, reports of dead and tumored cattle, deer, chipmunks, and other wildlife near fracturing sites have surfaced in various locations.

Dimrock, PA, has become synonymous with the danger of fracking and not only because of the chemical leak that leaked into Stevens Creek. In this small town wells have exploded, drinking water has been contaminated, and radioactive water sits in holding ponds on farmers’ land.

Water is far to precious to be riddled with toxic waste. Our drinking water and the health of people and wildlife depend on us protecting valuable groundwater from misuse. Share the video clips from Gasland with your friends to spread the word.

This post is part of Change.org’s Blog Action Day and is part of a larger conversation. Today, bloggers across the country are uniting to talk about one thing–water. It is cross-posted on the National Wildlife Federation’s Action Fund website.

Over the last five years, it’s been one thing after another threatening to take the character and beauty from our public lands. From fossil fuel development occurring at an unprecedented rate and conducted rashly and irresponsibly to dirty mining and threats to sell-off public lands for short term gains, public lands have been abused and all but forgotten as the national treasure they truly are.

Almost 1/3 of the United States is public lands — lands held in trust by all Americans that provide vital habitat for our wildlife, clean water and open space for recreation. They are also lands we will pass on to our children, and our children’s children to experience.

Last week the senate passed the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act, which contains more than 160 separate public lands bills, most of which will expand the protection of our public lands. The Act will provide the largest expansion of the National Wilderness Preservation System in 15 years, designating 2.1 million acres of permanent wilderness in nine states — California, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, Michigan, Oregon, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia.

Another one of the bills in the package — the National Landscape Conservation System Act — will provide permanent protection for the first new system of conservation lands in the United States in more than 50 years. Under the National Landscape Conservation System Act, over 850 federally recognized areas covering 27 million acres of the Bureau of Land Management’s most spectacular land and waters will be protected permanently.

The Act now moves to House of Representatives, which is expected to consider it in the coming weeks. Visit www.OurPublicLands.org for more information.