Reposted from It’s Getting Hot In Here
By Matt Wilkerson

If you live in the Southeast and want to do something for the struggle against mountaintop removal coal mining come on over to Atlanta March 1st to tell the EPA to ban MTR.

End Mountain Top Removal!
* Rally for the Mountains in Atlanta *
1:00 pm Monday, March 1st
EPA Region 4 Headquarters
Meet outside the Sam Nunn Atlanta Federal Center
61 Forsyth Street, SW Atlanta, GA 30303

To date, the practice of mountain top removal coal mining has leveled more than 800 square miles of mountains across Appalachia, destroyed over 2,000 miles of freshwater streams, and poisoned and displaced countless communities that call the mountains home. Each working day, 3,000,000 pounds of explosives are used against the mountains of West Virginia alone.

It is time to end this tragedy. On March 1st, join Asheville Rising Tide, Rainforest Action Network and other allies as we demand that the EPA do their job to protect the land, water, and livelihoods of Appalachian coalfields residents. EPA’s Region 4 office in Atlanta has the power to stop granting new mountain top removal mining permits, and the EPA nationally has the power to ban this devastating practice forever. They need to hear from us! More »

Sunday, November 8th, 2009- Philly activists protested and flyered today outside the Opening Session of the American Public Health Association’s 137 Annual Meeting at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, where EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson was a keynote speaker.

The activists were demanding that Ms.Jackson end blasting on Coal River Mountain in Coal River, WV. The mountain is the site of a campaign by local residents for a commercial-scale wind farm. A wind resources assessment and economic study commissioned by the group Coal River Mountain Watch in 2008 revealed that Coal River Mountain has enough wind potential to provide electricity for over 85,000 homes.

Instead, the EPA has allowed Massey Energy, one of the largest coal producers in the country, to begin blasting at Coal River Mountain as part of mountaintop removal mining excavation. The blasting is occurring near the Brushy Fork impoundment, the largest slurry dam in Appalachia. Critics of mountaintop removal argue that an estimated 1,000 lives are at risk if the dam at Brushy Fork were to fail. Last December, a containment pond in Kingston, Tennessee burst, flooding the area with over one billion gallons of coal ash sludge, producing the largest environmental disaster in United States history.

Attendees to the APHA’s annual meeting were given flyers on their way into the opening session urging them to “Tell Lisa Jackson: Save Coal River Mountain.” Ms. Jackson and the EPA have been the targets of a campaign by a coalition of environmental groups working to end mountaintop removal for several months.