Comments on: Coal Ash: 130 Million Tons of Waste
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- Pro-coal-ash folks:
You could not make this stuff up. It's real, it's happening. It's what happens when the regulators (and the US Congress) becomes captives of the regulated industry.
When Samuel Insull came up with the idea of state-regulated public utilities commissions -- which have some authority over coal ash sites certainly -- he created the model because he knew that industry could control the regulators.
Can you say ENRON?
How about Lehman Brothers, or the other banksters who got billions and billions, while homeowners are going bankrupt.
Noah - Reply to this comment
- More nuclear power!
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- I live in Giles County, VA. Appalachian Power Company is dumping their fly ash in the flood plain of the New River. A group of citizens started fighting this long before the first truck was dumped. We approached local and state lawmakers, we got DEQ involved. We even took them to court to get it stopped, citing it as a public nuisance. The Grand Jury did not even interview any of the people who brought the lawsuit. Some say the jury members were bought off, but I would hate to think that was true. Many questions have surfaced over conflict of interest and the money involved. What has amazed me is the total indiffernce of some of our citizens. Our battle over the fly ash certainly made me understand how dictatorships are formed. It is time the people in America stand up for what is right and demand that our lawmakers answer to us and not to power companies and big money.
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- Jim Roewer, as a lobbyist for the power industry you know that the cost that doesn't come cheap is the cost of proper disposal of coal ash. Would you rather figure the cost of proper storage or the billions more that is necessary to clean up the industry's mess that results from the unsupervised recycling scam called "beneficial Use" I figure either way is more reason to end coal energy production and stop producing hazardous waste. If the power industry would clean up it's act, environmental protection would come cheap.
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- Published this after the Tennessee disaster. As you can see, this goes back to the early 70's..... And you accepted that sorry excuse for a representative of the industry.... no wonder there are endless disasters.... "Follow the money"..... to the strip mines, to the deep mines, to the slag dams, to the black lung......"Mr. Peabody's coal train has hauled it away" (the whole mountain).
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When will they ever learn??????
Tennessee should never have happened.
This was presented 35 years ago when I was a member of the Diocesan Council of the Episcopal Church in Maryland, and a Board Member of APSO (Appalachian Peoples' Service Organization). I traveled many times into various areas of Appalachia, and spoke throughout the Diocese and at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church to enlighten and, hopefully, inspire.
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Oct. 28, 1973.
Do you have any fears?
Are you afraid of dying? Are you afraid of dying in the general sense? That is... that we all don't want to leave behind our world of family and friends? Or are you afraid of dying in a tormented way.... perhaps because of something specific that happened in your life?
There is a man in Western Maryland who is afraid of dying..... not "to die".... but he is tormented, because of something that happened last summer.
It rained last summer....
Now, that shouldn't frighten a man....
It's just that this was a heavy rain.
And that shouldn't frighten a man.... But this rain last summer came down hard and fast and LONG.
Up on top of the mountain several hundreds of acres had been stripped for the coal. There lay a sediment pond.... a pond of water held back by a hump of loose stone and mud. Pouring into that pond was all the runoff from the top of that mountain. There were no other diversions to share the burden.
Well, out on the farm, when too much water pours down the lane, Scooter and Sarah's little dams pop and shatter under the pressure and the water washes on out into the pasture, taking toy boats and twigs with it. They laugh and run to catch them and start again.
Back on the mountain, when the torrential rains overcame the pitiful dirt hump on the downward side of the sediment pond, that water too, popped and shattered the dam. It whipped down the side of the mountain, tearing trees out by the roots, heaving boulders and rocks, cutting a path through the area it traveled, whether there was a building there or not.
It took Mr. Robinson's barn .... and then it took Mr. Robinson's doghouse....and then it took Mr. Robinson's dog.... yes, dear dog was drowned..... and, by the grace of God, it didn't take Mr. Robinson's wife.... or Mr. Robinson.
Nor did it take the man who is afraid of dying.
Now Mr. Robinson is afraid, and angry, but his fear is not the one to which I'm speaking.
This other man, of whom I'm speaking, was bypassed by a few hundred feet... not because he heard the thundering roar of a mountain coming down on him and ran to safer ground. He was bypassed, only by the grace of God.... and he didn't know until the waters subsided that he would be spared.
This man had been paralyzed for many years and lay alone in his house, unable to help himself. And the waters and rocks and trees and buildings and animals roared by.
Can you imagine the fear he must have experienced?
The stories of what went on in George's Creek last summer are too numerous for the time available, but that horror story can be repeated wherever they are stripping in Appalachia. However, in many instances, lives were not spared. All the controversy, human suffering, pollution, erosion and heartbreak which strip mining has caused in Appalachia is for only 1% of the total recoverable coal reserves of the United States. That's right.... only 1% of the available coal in the U.S. can be obtained by stripping in Appalachia. Can it be worth it?
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We in this part of Maryland have many advantages that can be utilized in the struggle. Become informed. You will know what your actions must be...to APSO, the Episcopal arm in Appalachia, with CORA, the combined forces of many in Appalachia.
Know what the needs are:-
We need to understand the cycle of despair when several generations have been raised in a paternalistic society and Papa Coal walks out and leaves the kiddies on their own with no facilities, no training, no power, no resources, having stolen their inheritance through "broad-form deeds" and manipulation. And then says, "O.K., kids, make something of yourselves."
We need people to go to Washington and Annapolis and legislate to abolish strip mining. (Do you realize that right now thousands of acres of your Savage River State Forest are being ravaged by Buffalo Coal Company?)
WE NEED LEGISLATION AND ENFORCEMENT. - Reply to this comment
- 60 Minutes failed to mention that the Federal government has been studying coal ash for decades, including both democratic and repblican administrations, and has not found enough evidence to justify regulating it. It is not hazardous.
Note also the that utility company that had Kinston spill is the TVA, a utility companed OWNED and OPERATED by the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. It is not a private utility company. - Reply to this comment
- Maybe CBS' 60 minutes,should check in to see why the customers of TVA and the electric power boards associated with TVA, are being allowed to charge customers in TN; N.C.; Al; GA; VA. and Ky.,for the cleanup of the sludge spill in TN. This was not our fault ,but that of TVA itself.Jerry W.
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- How can we STOP THIS CRAZINESS ?? can someone tell me, i am in, just tell me and i will EVERYONE!!
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- hello----- WHY DID THE HOST OF THIS WHERE A FACE MASK WHEN THEY WERE DOING THIS STORY?? WALKING ON THE COAL.. SO DANGEROUS, WHY NOT SHOW THE AVERAGE PERSON THAT THIS IS SERIOUS BY EXAMPLE?? WHAT TYPE OF EXAMPLE ARE YOU IF YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT THIS MESS AND HOW DANGEROUS IT IS BUT YOU AREWALKING ON IN HUGE MESS AND JUST "LA la" walking and talkng like "ya this is so dangerous BUT I WILL do this interview with you with NO protection and walking on this because i am NOT paying attention to what i am TALKING ABOUT!!!!!" aRE YOU kinding me..how can anybody REALLY HEAR you of most of AMERICA IS DEPENDING on YOU to pay attention for them!!!!!!!!
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- Dang internet is so n=bad that i don't want to even leave a comment.
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