Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Mountaintop Removal

I  have great respect for miners and any people who work hard for their living but my "gut" says this just can't be the right thing to do.
Coming from a state where coal is in the top three as an income source, I know just how important it is as a resource.
But we must know something better than this.
I've been told that it is great for our economy but if that is true then why are areas with the most coal among the poorest in the nation and with the highest unemployment?
Coal extracting in this manner makes the surrounding community unpalatable as a place to live and raise a family or start a business unless you happen to have been born and raised in the area. I realize that there is much more to both sides of the argument and that it is a very complicated issue.  We definitely cannot go away from coal "cold turkey." (Note the Thanksgiving word choice.) No, we must gradually wean ourselves off its dependence and our dependence upon the jobs it creates. Perhaps a place where the mountains are intact would be more inviting, particularly if they weren't totally owned by large companies that only want to extract the resource, not create a community.  
There must be a better solution than this.
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4 comments:

Out on the prairie said...

Sad to see the scars. We had lots here in iowa, and often can see the dumped slag.the coal trains are constant passing through.

mary said...

Good job, Nelle.

Andrea said...

I am with you. This is our problem too here in our poor but resource-rich country. Most of the mining companies here are owned by foreigners and just like yours, the remnants of mining are very bad eyesores, as well as devastating to the environment and the future. We have experiences of very bad pollutions, landslides, flooding and a lot more. I think if all the children are properly educated, they will not return to mining when they grow up.

黄清华 Wong Ching Wah said...

Difficult to find solution, I here it is called "for the sake of progress" ... unfortunately nature is to be sacrificed ! And also the greed of some man and others who need to make a living !