Utah’s next governor, Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert (R-UT) told the Western
Governors’ Association “it appears to him science on global
warming is not necessarily
conclusive.” He is replacing Gov. Jon Huntsman, nominated to be the
ambassador to China, who entered Utah into the Western Climate
Initiative.
“Aides to Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-WV) are in southern West Virginia for
what they call a three-day fact-finding tour about mountaintop removal
mining,” meeting with “coal
industry officials, environmentalists and citizens.”
Global warming “could lead to the greatest human migration in
history”
uprooting between 200 million and 700 million people by 2050, according
to the International Organization for Migration.
The Obama administration “plans to announce Thursday a proposal to
eliminate the expedited
reviews that have made it
easier for mining companies to get approval” for mining “the
Appalachians by blasting off mountaintops and discarding the rubble in
stream valleys.”
Although Interior Secretary Ken Salazar made it clear he “likes
coal,”
the Interior Department “said on Monday it will try to overturn a Bush
administration
rule
that made it easier for coal mining companies to dump mountaintop debris
into valley streams.”
Speaking about the Waxman-Markey clean energy bill, Rep. Gene Green
(D-TX) called for free pollution
permits to petroleum
refiners and Rep. G. K. Butterfield called for free pollution permits to
electric distribution companies. These companies have given more than
$375,000 to energy committee
members in the first
three months of 2009.
Last Thursday, Don Blankenship, CEO of Massey
Energy, the fourth largest United States coal company, described his
critics as “communists,” “atheists,” and “greeniacs.” In an address
before the Tug Valley Mining Institute in Williamson, WV, Blankenship
said those who criticize him are “our
enemies”
like Osama bin Laden:
It is as great a pleasure for me to be criticized by the communists
and the atheists of the Charleston Gazette as to be applauded by my
best friends. Because I know they are wrong. People are cowering away
from being criticized by people that are our enemies. Would we be
upset if Osama bin Laden was critical of us?
These are actually mild words for Don Blankenship. This spring,
Blankenship was caught on tape threatening to
shoot
an ABC reporter and then assaulting
him:
The Charleston Gazette’s coverage of Don Blankenship has included these
controversial stories:
The Fatal Aracoma Mine Fire.
In the months before the fatal 2006 fire at the Aracoma mine, which
had 25 violations of health and safety laws, Blankenship personally
waived company policy and told mine managers to ignore rules and “run
coal.”
Political Corruption.
Blankenship has spent millions of dollars to influence West Virginia
judgeships and state legislative races, and palled around in Monte
Carlo with state Supreme Court Chief Justice Elliott “Spike” Maynard
and their “female friends” in July 2006. The state court reversed a
$77 million verdict against
Massey in 2008.
Mountaintop
Removal.
Massey Energy is the king of the incredibly destructive practice of
mountaintop removal mining. The Bush Administration (which includes
former Massey officials) overturned Clinton-era rules limiting the
practice. Massey now plans to destroy Coal River
Mountain despite lacking
necessary permits.
How many times have the people in this room heard, at the US Chamber
of Commerce or at the National Mining Association, “I don’t believe in
climate change, but I’m afraid to say that because it is a political
reality”? The greeniacs are taking over the world.
The House Committee on Global Warming and Energy Independence has issued
a report, Past is
Prologue,
listing many of the energy and environmental regulations, rulemakings,
and notices the Bush administration is expected to issue (or in some
cases, illegally avoid issuing) in its final months in office. As R.
Jeffrey Smith writes in the Washington
Post,
“The new rules would be among the most controversial deregulatory steps
of the Bush era and could be difficult for his successor to undo.”
Here’s a partial list:
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) plans to finalize an
NSR rule before the end of the
administration that would essentially exempt all existing power plants
from having to install new pollution control technology when these
plants are updated.
In a separate NSR rule,
EPA plans to exempt so-called “fugitive”
emissions – meaning emissions that don’t come out of the end of a
stack such as volatile organic compounds emitted from leaking pipes
and fittings at petroleum refineries – from consideration in
determining whether NSR is triggered.
EPA is also set to finalize a third rule
weakening the NSR program, by allowing
so-called “batch process facilities” – like oil refineries and
chemical plants – to artificially ignore certain emissions when
determining when NSR is triggered.
EPA is also working towards weakening air
pollution regulations on power plants and other emissions sources
adjacent to national parks and other pristine, so-called “Class I”
areas. By changing the modeling of new power plants’ impact on air
quality in national parks – using annual emissions averages as opposed
to shorter daily or monthly periods – the
EPA rule will make it easier for such plants
to be built close to parks.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) issued
proposed regulations to implement the EISA
fuel economy standards (increase by the maximum feasible amount each
year, such that it reaches at least 35 miles per gallon by 2020) in
April 2008, and final regulations are expected soon. If
NHTSA used EIA’s
higher gasoline price scenario—a range of $3.14/gallon in 2016 to
$3.74/gallon in 2030—the technology is available to cost-effectively
achieve a much higher fleet wide fuel economy of nearly 35 mpg in 2015
– instead of the 31.6 mpg in 2015 under the lower gas prices used in
NHTSA’s proposed rule.
EPA is expected to issue proposed
regulations soon on the renewable fuels provisions passed in
EISA that required America’s fuel supply to
include 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2022 – together with
more specific volumetric requirements and lifecycle greenhouse gas
benchmarks for “advanced” renewable fuels, cellulosic ethanol, and
biodiesel.
The Department of the Interior (DOI) has already telegraphed its
intention to gut the Endangered Species Act by rushing through 300,000
comments on proposed rules in 32 hours, then providing a mere 10-day
public comment period on the Environmental Assessment of the proposed
rules change. The proposed rules would take expert scientific review
out of many Endangered Species Act (ESA) processes, and could exempt
the effects of global warming pollution on threatened or endangered
species.
DOI intends to finalize new regulations
governing commercial development of oil shale on more than 2 million
acres of public lands in the West.
DOI’s Office of Surface Mining is expected
before the end of the administration to issue a final rule that would
extend the current rule (which requires a 100-foot buffer zone around
streams to protect them from mining practices) so that it also applies
to all other bodies of water, such as lakes, ponds and wetlands. But
the rule would also exempt many harmful practices – such as permanent
coal waste disposal facilities – and could even allow for changing a
waterway’s flow.
EPA has already missed several deadlines to
finalize a rule addressing whether concentrated animal feeding
operations (CAFOs) are required to obtain permits under the Clean
Water Act.
EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers may
issue a revised guidance memo on how to interpret the phrase “waters
of the United States” in the Clean Water Act, which determines what
water bodies are subject to regulation under the Act.
Under the Omnibus appropriations bill for FY
2008, EPA was directed to establish a mandatory reporting rule
for greenhouse gas emissions, using its existing authority under the
Clean Air Act, by September 2008. EPA has
been working on a proposed rule, which may or may not be issued before
the end of the Bush administration. EPA will
not issue a final rule before the end of the administration.
Please join mountain lovers from across the country to:
Celebrate Appalachia
Join citizens in the fight to protect their communities from mountaintop
removal mining.
Reception Hosted By:
The Alliance For Appalachia
Appalachian Citizens Law Center * Appalachian Voices * Appalshop *
Coal River Mountain Watch * Heartwood * Kentuckians For The
Commonwealth * MACED * Ohio Valley
Environmental Coalition * Save Our Cumberland Mountains * Sierra Club
Environmental Justice Program * Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards
* Southwings * West Virginia Highlands Conservancy
With special thanks to:
Alaska Wilderness League, Appalachian Center for the Economy and the
Environment, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Christians for the
Mountains, EarthJustice, Environment America, Friends of the Earth,
Natural Resource Defense Council, Rainforest Action Network, and the
national Sierra Club.