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July 9th, 2012
As Mine Protections Fail, Black Lung Cases Surge It wasn’t supposed to happen to coal miners in Mark McCowan’s generation. It wasn’t supposed to strike so early and so hard. At age 47 and just seven years after his first diagnosis, McCowan shouldn’t have a chest X-ray that looks this bad. Graphic What Is Black Lung? “I’m seeing more definition in the mass,” McCowan says, pausing for deep breaths as he holds the X-ray film up to the light of his living room window in Pounding Mill, Va. “The mass is larger and more defined in the right upper lobe,” he continues, clinically describing the solid streak that shows up white on the X-ray of his lungs. “If you know white is bad and black is good, I’m in a lot of trouble.” McCowan went from a clean X-ray at age 35 to progressive massive fibrosis — an advanced stage of coal workers’ pneumoconiosis, or black lung — in just five years. “You go from being normal to where … one day you try to do something you used to do, and you can’t do it and you’re just heaving to catch your breath,” McCowan says. “And you say this is crazy. It can’t be this bad. And then you realize a couple months down the road that it can be. And you realize a year down the road after that that you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

As Mine Protections Fail, Black Lung Cases Surge

It wasn’t supposed to happen to coal miners in Mark McCowan’s generation. It wasn’t supposed to strike so early and so hard. At age 47 and just seven years after his first diagnosis, McCowan shouldn’t have a chest X-ray that looks this bad.

“I’m seeing more definition in the mass,” McCowan says, pausing for deep breaths as he holds the X-ray film up to the light of his living room window in Pounding Mill, Va.

“The mass is larger and more defined in the right upper lobe,” he continues, clinically describing the solid streak that shows up white on the X-ray of his lungs. “If you know white is bad and black is good, I’m in a lot of trouble.”

McCowan went from a clean X-ray at age 35 to progressive massive fibrosis — an advanced stage of coal workers’ pneumoconiosis, or black lung — in just five years.

“You go from being normal to where … one day you try to do something you used to do, and you can’t do it and you’re just heaving to catch your breath,” McCowan says. “And you say this is crazy. It can’t be this bad. And then you realize a couple months down the road that it can be. And you realize a year down the road after that that you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

June 29th, 2012
earthandscience: The US Gov. Just Sold 721 Million Tons of Coal for Literally Cheaper than Dirt Dirt has long held the distinction of upholding the very standard of worthlessness. It is enshrined in our vernacular as such: When something, say, Herman Cain 2012 campaign memorabilia, is said to be “cheaper than dirt,” that thing is being hyperbolically referred to as available at a surprisingly low cost. It is almost never actually cheaper than dirt. But coal is. At least, if you buy it from the United States government, and mine it on public land. You see, the Bureau of Land Management just held a giant coal “auction” for 721 million tons of coal that was for all intents and purposes a sham—the only bidder was Peabody, a company that also had the privilege of setting the price it wanted to pay. Peabody decided that it wanted to pay $1.10 per ton, and the BLM said, “You got it, buddy.” Essentially, the BLM gave Peabody a huge, carbon-rich handout. Why? Is the pleasantly named coal company a struggling, scrappy upstart that needs government help to make ends meet? Nope. It’s the largest private sector coal company in the entire world. And the sham deal, which is outrageous but probably legal (federal investigators are actually looking into that matter right now), just cost taxpayers $1.2 billion in lost revenues.   ^This is outrageous. 

earthandscience:

The US Gov. Just Sold 721 Million Tons of Coal for Literally Cheaper than Dirt

Dirt has long held the distinction of upholding the very standard of worthlessness. It is enshrined in our vernacular as such: When something, say, Herman Cain 2012 campaign memorabilia, is said to be “cheaper than dirt,” that thing is being hyperbolically referred to as available at a surprisingly low cost. It is almost never actually cheaper than dirt.

But coal is. At least, if you buy it from the United States government, and mine it on public land. You see, the Bureau of Land Management just held a giant coal “auction” for 721 million tons of coal that was for all intents and purposes a sham—the only bidder was Peabody, a company that also had the privilege of setting the price it wanted to pay. Peabody decided that it wanted to pay $1.10 per ton, and the BLM said, “You got it, buddy.”

Essentially, the BLM gave Peabody a huge, carbon-rich handout. Why? Is the pleasantly named coal company a struggling, scrappy upstart that needs government help to make ends meet? Nope. It’s the largest private sector coal company in the entire world. And the sham deal, which is outrageous but probably legal (federal investigators are actually looking into that matter right now), just cost taxpayers $1.2 billion in lost revenues.  

^This is outrageous. 

February 8th, 2012

5 Amazing Places in the US in Danger of Being Destroyed by Dirty Energy

The Obama administration’s rejection of the Keystone XL Pipeline was a major victory for environmentalists. For far too long, the fossil fuel industry has decimated ecosystems and destroyed human lives. Local opposition, grassroots organizing and Republican grandstanding doomed the pipeline as presently conceived to failure.

TransCanada, the company behind Keystone XL, showed the petroleum industry’s usual indifference to people and nature. It planned on running the pipeline through Nebraska’s ecologically sensitive Sandhills. Just beneath the Sandhills lays the Ogallala Aquifer, the major source of irrigation on the Great Plains. If the oil leaks into the aquifer, the prime source of water for America’s breadbasket would be contaminated.

Read More.

November 10th, 2011

Republican Rep from Texas commissions study on economic impacts of clean energy (solar, hydro, etc.). Republican Rep from Texas then recieves report, reads that clean energy will benefit economy. Republican Rep from Texas doesn't like this answer. Republican Rep from Texas dutifully comdemns report, blames Obama for killing the coal industry. The Aristrocrats!

(Source: climateadaptation)

November 2nd, 2011
The Environmental Protection Agency has been looking into better ways to regulate coal ash since there are huge, huge pits of the stuff sitting around aging coal fire plants all over the country. Often, as in Wisconsin today, they are conveniently poised right next to the source of drinking water for millions of people. Two weeks ago, Republicans in the House voted to block the EPA from being able to do anything about this. They voted to block the EPA from having authority over coal ash which, after all, the industry says is healthy, absolutely nothing to worry about. Lake Michigan full of coal ash? Well, that’s no different than Lake Michigan with no coal ash in it. Have a sip, take a dip, eat some fish, it’s fine.
Rachel Maddow on the lack of regulations leading up to Monday’s Oak Creek, Wisconsin coal ash spill
March 20th, 2011
azspot: Joe Heller

azspot:

Joe Heller

(via kateoplis)