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    The Last Mountain

    By Donal on Sun, 07/10/2011 - 9:03pm | Technology

    Miller-McCune profiles a new documentary about destroying the environment to get coal.

     

    ​The film makes clear that Massey operates practically with impunity. Although the EPA finally caught up with the company in 2007, it fined it $20 million for its numerous violations  — a drop in the bucket for a multibillion-dollar corporation. And while an independent investigation recently declared the company grossly negligent in the 2010 Upper Big Branch mining disaster that killed 29 workers, history suggests Massey might get yet another slap on the wrist.

    “Last year, I debated Don Blankenship [former CEO of Massey Energy] and asked if it was possible for his company to make a profit without breaking the law,” says Kennedy. “And he said no. He was acknowledging this was a criminal enterprise.” 

    But  The Last Mountain is not just an anti-Massey screed. It also questions this country’s commitment to renewable power sources like wind and solar, and the policies — like government subsidies for the coal industry — that make it difficult to move to an environmentally sound energy plan. The film does point out that wind farms are gaining more and more traction — supposedly the wind industry now employs as many people as coal — but it’s just a drop in the bucket in terms of America’s energy needs.

    Ultimately, The Last Mountain is a horror story about the unholy alliance between big business and big government, with the poor citizens of places like the Coal River Valley crushed by their complicity.

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    Comments

    Clean coal and dirty water!

    I first saw the damage that these shale gas companies are doing on 60 Minutes I think!

    Coal and the environment was one of the main themes in Justified this year.

    Clean coal and clean gas and clean oil.

    Propaganda has reached new heights.

    The truth is jobs are lost when a state just says 'no'!

    North Dakota is just booming with the new oil finds.

    Places like Louisiana and Florida lose a lot of money when the state or Federal EPA shows up.

    I do not see any answer because the repubs will never ever ever invest in 'renewables' and many dems will not either.


    by Richard Day on Tue, 07/12/2011 - 12:43am

    Actually wind renewables are being promoted by a Republican with a fossil fuels background. Denise Bode, head of the American Wind Energy Association is the daughter of an oil exec, was President of the Independent Petroleum Association of America for six years, and as a Republican was an OK energy commissioner for six years and unsuccessfully ran for OK Attorney General and Congress. Renewables probably won't catch on until and unless they are fully owned and operated by the people that own the fossil fuel industry now.

    So it's no surprise that renewables, which do have a lot of promise, tend to be operated with as little concern for the environment as is the fossil fuel industry.


    by Donal on Tue, 07/12/2011 - 7:54am

    Host Ira Glass tells the stories of two professors, each making a calculation that no one had made before. One gets acclaim. One ends up out of a job. The first, Terry Engelder, a geologist at Penn State, was estimating the amount of natural gas that's recoverable from the Marcellus shale, a giant rock formation that's under Pennsylvania and several other Eastern states. The second, Conrad "Dan" Volz, at the University of Pittsburgh, estimated how much toxic crap—chemicals and pollution from gas exploration—might be getting into water supplies. (6 1/2 minutes)

     

    http://www.thisamericanlife.org/play_full.php?play=440&podcast=1


    by A Guy Called LULU on Tue, 07/12/2011 - 9:36am