UPDATE: 7:00am, Friday March 19–After 24 hours activists are still locked down in front of the EPA headquarters in Washington, DC demanding justice for the people of Appalachia and protection for our historic mountains and precious water resources.

MTR Activists Lock Down At EPA

Photos by Chris Eichler

Group Erects Purple Mountain Majesty At EPA: “If Administrator Lisa Jackson Won’t Visit the Appalachian Mountains, They’ll Bring the Mountains to Her”

At 7:00 am this morning, a dozen brave activists released a 25-foot banner on the lawn of the EPA headquarters in Washington, DC. The message on the banner calls on the EPA to pledge to end mountaintop removal coal mining in 2010. But there’s a catch—the banner and two of its holders are suspended from two freestanding tripods 20-feet above the air, and after seven hours they are still hanging there with no sign of coming down.

Today’s protest is an attempt to further pressure EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to enforce the Clean Water Act and halt mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR). Called the worst of the worst strip mining, the practice blows the tops off of whole mountains and contaminates drinking water all for a tiny amount of coal. Activists in today’s protest say they won’t leave unless Administrator Jackson commits to a flyover visit of the Appalachian Mountains and MTR sites, which, shockingly, she has never done before.

After seven hours, Administrator Jackson has made no such commitment. However, a few hours ago she tweeted her response to the protest gathering attention outside her window. As Administrator Jackson said in her tweet: “People are here today expressing views on MTM, a critical issue to our country. They’re concerned abt human health & water quality & so am I.”
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Hi Res Pictures

Activists Risk Arrest with Elaborate Protest at EPA HQ; Demand Immediate Action to Stop Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining

Group Erects Purple Mountain Majesty At EPA; Say “If Administrator Lisa Jackson Won’t Visit the Appalachian Mountains, They Will Bring The Mountains to Her”

WASHINGTON— In an attempt to further pressure EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to enforce the Clean Water Act and halt mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR), activists early this morning erected two 20-foot-tall, purple tripod structures in front of the agency’s headquarters. A pair of activists perched at the top of the tripods have strung a 25-foot sign in front of the EPA’s door that reads, “EPA: pledge to end mountaintop removal in 2010.” Six people are locked to the tripods and say they won’t leave unless Administrator Jackson commits to a flyover visit of the Appalachian Mountains and MTR sites, which she has never done before.

This is the latest in a series of actions and activities aimed at pressuring the EPA to take more decisive action on mountaintop removal coal mining. Today’s tactic is modeled on the multi-day tree-sits that have been happening in West Virginia to protect mountains from coal companies’ imminent blasting. Called the worst of the worst strip mining, the practice blows the tops off of whole mountains to scoop out the small seams of coal that lie beneath.

“We’re losing our way of life and our culture,” said Chuck Nelson, who worked as a coal miner in West Virginia for three decades and came to DC to support today’s protest. “Mountaintop removal should be banned today. The practice means total devastation for communities, the hardwood forests, the ecosystems, and the headwaters. Why should our communities sacrifice everything we have?” More »

Satellite photos recently released by NASA illustrate the real impacts of mountaintop removal (MTR) mining in Appalachia.

They were taken between 1984 and 2009 at the Hobet mine site in Boone County, West Virginia.

You can see through the time lapse the scale of the deforestation that has taken place, followed by the leveling of the mountain tops and filling of the valleys.

This is the same Hobet mine that was recently awarded a permit to expand by the EPA.

We urge EPA administrator Lisa Jackson to examine this practice firsthand, and take a citizen-led flyover of Appalachia before she considers issuing any further MTR mining permits.

Today the EPA’s two regional offices that have jurisdiction over new mountaintop removal coal mining permits got visits by RAN activists. Atlanta’s Region 4 office oversees new MTR permits in Kentucky and Tennessee, while Philadelphia’s Region 3 office is responsible for new permits in Virginia and West Virginia. Read about Philadelphia’s protest here.

Carrying banners and signs and wearing giant puppet costumes, over 60 activists rallied outside Atlanta’s Federal Building which houses the EPA’s regional office and demanded that Region 4 Regional Administrator, Stanley Meiburg, take a stand against mountaintop removal coal mining.

We heard from speakers, chanted anti-mtr chants, and acted out a skit in which the EPA and King Coal are set to get married, until (a fictional) Regional Administrator Meiburg steps in to stop the ceremony and stand up to defend air and water quality from the coal industry’s destruction.

After the skit a couple of us went inside the Federal Building to bring our anti-mtr message directly to the EPA. We were able to meet with Mr. Meiburg himself and we talked at length about our concerns about mountaintop removal. Meiburg agreed to bring together decision makers from Region 4 regarding MTR to meet with RAN and our Appalachian allies in the near future. We will be working hard to make sure that meeting happens soon and that Region 4 hears our message loud and clear – stay tuned!

All in all, today’s protest was a great success, thanks to all the great Southern activists who came out to make their voices heard!

-Annie

Last Thursday, Rainforest Action Network along with several online allies including 350.org, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, the Waterkeeper Alliance, the Ruckus Society and others re-branded JP Morgan Chase in social media networks as being the largest U.S. funder of mountaintop removal [which is also the truth, BTW].

In the days before, the re-branding of Chase went viral. Armed with a thumbmail picture and a few status messages, people all over the internet let their friends and family know the truth about Chase and mountaintop removal.

Through the course of the day, we hit Chase in the following ways:

-RAN and allies Tweeted to over 330,000 people
-RAN and allies touched 180,000 people on Facebook
-had over 30 unique blogs posted, including posts on Huffington Post, Treehugger and Grist
-had 3,000 people “defriend” the Chase Community Giving Facebook fan page
-reports of dozens of people cancelling their Chase credit cards and bank accounts.
-one Appalachian activist started a “Boycott Chase” Facebook group.

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JP Morgan Chase is the biggest U.S. financier of mountaintop removal.

They have financial relationships with the poster child of mountaintop removal, Massey Energy. That means their money is funds sludge impoundments like Brushy Fork which is currently holding 7 billion gallons of coal waste above the Coal River Valley. Their money funds the dragline that 14 of my friends shut down in Twilight last June that scrapes away house size chunks of earth after the mountain has been blasted. Their money funds the security guards and noise machines that harassed and abused 3 tree-sitters last month defending Coal River Mountain with non-violent direct action. Their money funds Don Blankenship’s helicopters, mansion and corrupt junkets to Spain with WV Supreme Court Justices .

Chase has hired PR firms to re-brand themselves on the internet as “charitable” and “benevolent” through their “Chase Community Giving sites and Facebook Fan Pages (even though they disallowed “political” groups from participating in any fundraising). Chase touts themselves as a green environmentally friendly bank. Their greenwashing, social media branding and high powered PR firms can’t hide the truth about what Chase really does. They are complicit in destroying Appalachia’s mountains, poisoning it’s communities with dirty water and ruining it’s economy by creating conditions that lead to the worst poverty in the country.
Today, we’re exposing that truth using tools on the internet that will concentrate tens of thousands of people on Chase brand they’ve spent so much money perfecting.

It’s time we amp up the pressure on Chase and take their money out of the coal industry. More »

I’m heartened to hear that British Columbia has made a firm commitment to protect the headwaters of Glacier National Park by banning mining and drilling in the Flathead River Valley.

http://3.ly/BritshColumbia

“There’s still work to be done here, but I’m not going to lie to you, I’m a pretty happy guy right now,” said Will Hammerquist of the National Parks Conservation Association. “You had a land-use plan in place that put mining above all other values. This announcement signals a shift away from that.“

Listening to the Obama’s State of the Union address last night, I was encouraged to hear that job creation is the President’s number one priority for 2010.

Well, here is some required reading for achieving that aim: last week’s report from Downstream Strategies in Morgantown, WV:

“The Decline of Central Appalachian Coal and the Need for Economic Diversification”

This report sets out the stark reality of the huge job loss in Central Appalachia since mountaintop removal coal replaced more traditional methods.

The good news is that there is an easy solution to replace the jobs and energy production – by stimulation local-owned renewable energy projects, through these five steps:

1) require that 25% of each state’s energy portfolio come from truly renewable energy sources by 2025;

2) incentivize the investment in and production of renewable energy resources, using mechanisms such as a Renewable Energy Production Incentive;

3) provide grants, tax credits, clean energy bonds, or low-interest loans to support the development of energy projects and the manufacture of component parts;

4) finance the development of fine-scale resource maps to identify locations for developing projects; and

5) create state-funded wind anemometer and Sonic Detection and Ranging loan programs to facilitate the measurement of local wind resources and support distributed wind energy development.

Across Country Coalition of Environmental Groups Call for EPA to Stop Recent Blasting on Coal River Mountain, WV; Site of Proposed Wind Farm

More than Fifty Stage Sit-In and Rally at EPA Headquarters in DC

What you can do right now: Call EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and ask her to stop the blasting at Coal River Mountain

Hundreds participated today with Mountain Justice, Rainforest Action Network and other environmental groups in nationwide protests demanding an end to mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia. As part of the national day of, 14 people staged a sit-in at the EPA headquarters in Washington, DC. They were joined by approximately 50 coalfield residents and allies who held a rally in front of the building.

Those in attendance represent a coalition of environmental groups and Appalachian community members who are asking the EPA to take immediate action to stop mountaintop removal coal mining. In particular, the group is asking the EPA to intervene in the destruction of Coal River Mountain, WV, the site of a potential 328-megawatt wind farm, which Massey Energy began blasting this week.

While President Obama spent the week trumpeting his administration’s support for clean energy, Massey Energy began dynamiting Coal River Mountain in West Virginia, a national flashpoint in the battle to replace destructive mountaintop removal coal mining practices with clean energy and green jobs.

“The fate of Coal River Mountain and our clean energy future is in the EPA’s hands,” said Kate Rooth of the Rainforest Action Network who took part in the sit-in. “By intervening to stop the blasting of Coal River Mountain and to protect our nation’s clean energy resources, the Obama Administration has a chance to show that it will stand up for the nation’s new energy priorities and green jobs even against persistent dirty coal interests; this is how we protect the economy and the planet.”

Coal River Mountain gained national notoriety after a study showed that its peaks and ridges have enough wind potential to provide 70,000 households with electricity, support 700 long-term green jobs and give back $1.7 million in annual county taxes. Over the objections of the local community, the site has been granted permits for mountaintop removal. Massey Energy began dynamiting peaks this week, which will destroy any hope for the proposed wind farm unless the EPA intervenes.

“Every day, more than 3 million pounds of explosives are detonated in our state to remove our mountains and expose the thin seams of coal beneath,” said Bo Webb, a resident of Coal River Valley WV and a participant in today’s rally. “President Obama, I beg you to re-light our flame of hope and honor and immediately stop the coal companies from blasting so near our homes and endangering our lives. As you have said, we must find another way than blowing off the tops of our mountains. We must end mountaintop removal.”

If the blasting at Coal River Mountain is allowed to continue, mountaintop removal coal mining will destroy one of the last intact mountains in Appalachia. In the process, it will endanger hundreds of people living in the valley below, as the project requires blasting dynamite less than 100 yards from the largest coal sludge impoundment in the country. Massey Energy’s own assessment indicates that if the impoundment, an earthen dam, is breached more than eight billion gallons of coal slurry will spill out endangering hundreds of people who would have less than five minutes to evacuate.

Early Thursday morning, local climate activists dropped a banner reading “Save Coal River Mtn.” from the 18th Street overpass above the Vine Street Expressway. The banner contrasted images of a wind farm and a bulldozer; the bottom read, “Coal Is Over.”

Massey Energy Company, one of the largest coal producers in the country, began blasting at Coal River Mountain last Friday, in Coal River, West Virginia. Last year the state issued permits to conduct mountain top removal on the site, despite protest by local residents. Witnesses saw blasts and smoke on Friday near the Brushy Fork coal slurry impoundment.

Slurry is the by-product of coal washing and processing and contains high levels of toxic heavy metals. The Brushy Fork impoundment, the largest slurry dam in Appalachia, has the capacity to hold 8.2 billion gallons. 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. More »