Losing Appalachia: Greed Fuels Mountain Top Mining

Whether they are majestic and rocky or green and smoky, mountains affect the wildlife, weather patterns and air quality of almost every person in the United States. For centuries, the mountains in the southeastern part of this country have provided more than just a nice place to hike, yet they have been gored, cleared and gutted to obtain a substance that’s considered much more precious by many industrial professionals: coal.

In this time of political and economic upheaval, we frequently hear about renewable fuels, green jobs and clean energy. Indeed, these technologies and opportunities are much more widely accepted now than they have ever been. However, changing the hearts and attitudes of the people and companies that depend on fossil fuels for their livelihoods is another matter. This takes a lot longer than it would take to come up with a clever marketing campaign.

Despite recent attention from the Obama Administration, a deplorable practice known as mountain top removal mining has been allowed to continue unabated in this country, especially in West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee.

A testament to the flippant attitude of the coal mining industry towards the delicate ecosystems that inhabit these mountains, the Environmental Protection Agency defines mountaintop removal or valley fill as “a mining practice where the tops of mountains are removed, exposing the seams of coal. Mountaintop removal can involve removing 500 feet or more of the summit to get at buried seams of coal. The earth from the mountaintop is then dumped in the neighboring valleys.”

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