|

Bush Administration to enshrine destructive coal mining practice

Byoliveridley

Rule to Expand Mountaintop Coal Mining – New York Times

The Bush administration is set to issue a regulation on Friday that would enshrine the coal mining practice of mountaintop removal. The technique involves blasting off the tops of mountains and dumping the rubble into valleys and streams.

The journalist who wrote this piece lets some unsupported talking points just slip by. First of all, coal does not solve the US dependence on “foreign oil”. Coal is used for electricity, oil is used for cars, there is little overlap. Secondly, he claims that mountaintop mining is safer. I guess it is safer because it is cheaper to ensure the safety of the miners above ground rather than underground. But, that does not make it inherently safer!

For all the devastating effects of mountaintop removal mining, including death, water pollution, habitat destruction, flooding, landslides, read this grist article from 2006.

The go-to site for activism relating to this issue is IloveMountains. Go see it!

Technorati Tags: , ,

Similar Posts

  • Do compact fluorescent bulbs reduce mercury pollution?

    Byoliveridley

    In places that rely heavily on coal for electricity, such as West Virginia or China, the researchers say switching to CFLs can reduce mercury emissions significantly. But cleaner-powered places like California and Norway would do better to stick to incandescent bulbs when it comes to reducing mercury. “The places known for sustainability are the places that have the potential to do the most harm by bringing this technology in,” says environmental engineer Julie Zimmerman of Yale, a coauthor of the study.

    Do compact fluorescent bulbs reduce mercury pollution?.

    The good news is that in general, CFLS reduce mercury emissions significantly compared to using regular bulbs in most cases. Very unfair on CFL mercury! This works if you assume that every mg of mercury in a CFL is going to be released into the air, which is bogus. They can be, and are recycled, or they end up being landfilled, where they will not escape for a while. I’ve never broken one in many years of use. This is not a fair comparison at all, and if you have to reach to California and Norway to make a point, you’ve lost it. The reason California and Norway (more about Norway in a later blog post) are more energy efficient is because they use more energy efficient systems (like CFLs) in the first place. Therefore, they do not have to rely on coal for energy requirements. Of course, they are also lucky to have hydroelectric/geothermal sources, but they avoid coal for good reason.

    If you reduce power usage by increasing efficiency, you don’t have to build more power plants (clean or otherwise) and that is good for everyone concerned.

    Yes, the take home message is that due to the presence of a hazardous ingredient, CFLs need to be viewed as a bridge technology to LEDs. Point taken, but given that they have all those advantages over regular light bulbs, this is no bridge to nowhere!

  • British Columbia Introduces a Carbon Tax

    Byoliveridley

    Wow, I am already proud of my future destination, a carbon tax, no less. One that will start off at $10 per tonne of carbon (2.4c per litre of gasoline, or about 9c a gallon) and rise by a factor of three in a few years…

    VICTORIA – Finance Minister Carole Taylor introduced an escalating carbon tax on most fossil fuels Tuesday, one she says recycles revenues back to taxpayers and businesses and is designed to ignite an environmental social movement in British Columbia and across Canada to fight climate change.And she’s handing every British Columbian $100 in June as seed money to get them thinking green.

    The Canadian Press: BC introduces carbon tax, but off-sets increased fuel costs with tax cuts

    The carbon tax advocacy center sets the required starter tax as 10c a gallon, BTW, so this measure by BC is no joke, it’s a serious effort to rein in CO2 emissions from the province. Carbon taxes are in general regressive as they are flat taxes, so the poor pay the same as the rich, but obviously will suffer more. So, what is the BC government doing to ensure that the poor don’t suffer?

    The carbon tax revenue, estimated to hit $1.8 billion over three years, will be returned to taxpayers through personal income tax and business tax cuts, she said.The government will introduce legislation that requires it to table an annual plan that shows how the carbon tax revenue will be returned to taxpayers, Taylor said

    Good words. But Taylor needs to realize that in the absence of well designed tax offsets, the people and businesses of BC will be at a temporary competitive disadvantage. It’s tricky to be an early adopter, but I am optimistic that BC will be the better for it.

    Wonderful, now the rest of Canada (and the US) needs to follow suit. And, I look forward to blogging about Canada already, exciting!

    Thanks of course to the grist for alerting me…

    Update: An economist allays my regressivity and harm to business fears…

    Blogged with Flock

    Tags: ,

  • A Bounty on the IPCC Global Warming Report

    Byoliveridley

    Scientists offered cash to dispute climate study | The Guardian | Guardian Unlimited

    Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world’s largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today. Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

    Well, that speaks for itself, no comment required.

  • Environmental Justice Protest in Scotland County, NC

    Byoliveridley


    Scotland County Of Tomorrow

    As some of you might know, it is a well known fact that race is a predominant factor in the siting of landfills (warning, pdf, but worth it!!). But the folks at the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network (NCEJN) and its member organizations do a wonderful job in organizing, protesting, and lobbying against this egregious practice. If you’re in the neighborhood (or in the mood for a road trip), please do consider joining the protest.

  • Big Wool and Fast Fashion

    Byoliveridley

    Cute sheep or not, factory farming is always impactful

     

    According to one analysis of wool production in Australia, by far the world’s top exporter, the wool required to make one knit sweater is responsible for 27 times more greenhouse gases than a comparable Australian cotton sweater, and requires 247 times more land.

    Source: Big Wool wants you to believe it’s nice to animals and the environment. It’s not.

    This is an interesting article in Vox on the outsized impacts of large-scale factory farming wool impacts. The article goes into further detail comparing wool to synthetics on impact (Both big, but different), and why plant-based alternatives like Tencel and Hemp and recycling have not taken off. It also discusses the increasing trend of wool blends.

    Widespread cheap synthetics have enabled fast fashion, making it possible for brands to produce stupefying volumes of disposable fabrics. These are now very commonly combined with wool to create hybrid garments. According to the Center for Biodiversity and Collective Fashion Justice’s recent analysis of 13 top clothing brands, more than half of wool items were blended with synthetics, giving them in-demand properties like machine washability

    Of course when you blend a wool and a synthetic, it is now landfill material. The issue with clothing (same as the issue with most scaled up factory production) is scale and economics. Fast fashion makes clothes that fall apart in 6 months and are impossible to fix. So whatever the raw material used, this trend ensures high production, quick profit, large impact and large waste. In addition, factory-scaled animal production is not really compatible with animal welfare.

    Unless the system changes, which will require a massive re-examination and re-jigging of our financial systems and reward/responsibility mechanisms, we will always have this issue.

  • |

    Friedman, India and Development

    Byoliveridley

    Where Thomas Friedman of the New York Times echoes a blog post of mine from a few months back about cheap cars, development models and India.

    We have no right to tell Indians what cars to make or drive. But we can urge them to think hard about following our model, without a real mass transit alternative in place. Cheap conventional four-wheel cars, which would encourage millions of Indians to give up their two-wheel motor scooters and three-wheel motorized rickshaws, could overwhelm India’s already strained road system, increase its dependence on imported oil and gridlock the country’s megacities.

    No, No, No, Don’t Follow Us – New York Times

    Here’s what I had to say…

    Is it necessary that India and China tread the same path as the U.S and Europe? Does India have to make and use cars that are built using technology developed prior to our knowledge of global warming? The same company that gets cautious praise from the Union of Concerned Scientists for its “leadership” role in global warming will turn around and build factories in India that carry the status quo forward for another 30 years. When you’re starting from the foundation, and you know that the plans provided to you will lead to your house crumbling in 20 years, would you use the plans anyway because your contractor provides you with no alternative? The logical answer seems to be no, but is this process logic driven, or enforced by the existing power structure?

    The answer should be “NO!!”. But Friedman goes ahead and offers some sensible suggestions via the very excellent Sunita Narain.

    Charge high prices for parking, charge a proper road tax for driving, deploy free air-conditioned buses that reach every corner of the city, expand the existing beautiful Delhi subway system, “and then let the market work,” she added.

    Good idea. Now, will Friedman turn around and offer the same prescription for the US? Apparently not. If the US cannot kick the car habit, or show other people how to, this kind of lecturing is pointless.

    Blogged with Flock