Appalachian apocalypse: Controversial Coal Mining Method Gets Obama's OK

[Bluebear]

Singer-Actress Ashley Judd speaks during a rally in Frankfort, Ky. on Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2009 calling for an end to mountaintop coal mining. (AP Photo/Roger Alford)

by Tom Hamburger and Peter Wallsten

WASHINGTON - With the election of Barack Obama, environmentalists expected to see the end of the "Appalachian apocalypse" -- their name for exposing coal deposits by blowing the tops off of whole mountains.

But in recent weeks, the Obama administration has quietly decided to open the way for at least two dozen more "mountaintop removal" projects.

The decision to clear a path for the controversial projects was never officially announced, but instead conveyed in a letter this month to a West Virginia congressman and coal ally, Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall. The letter said that the Environmental Protection Agency would not block 42 of 48 mine projects that it had reviewed so far, including some of the most controversial mountaintop mines.

In mountaintop removal, explosives blast away a peak and expose coal seams. Coal companies say the practice is safer and more efficient than traditional shaft mining. Critics say the process scars the landscape and dumps tons of waste, some of it toxic, into streams and valleys.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/06/02-4