A Corporate person commits homicide, what punishment for that person?

This idea of holding corporations accountable for their actions, see the Jim Hightower commentary below, just as we would any other person is appealing. After all the Supreme Court has decided these corporate persons have the same rights of free speech as you or I. We have the death penalty in America. How does one put a corporation to death for mass murder?

Here is some of  Jim Hightower's commentary on the idea.

" A mass murder has taken place in another American workplace, taking 29 lives. The authorities know who did it, so shouldn't that person be made to pay for this heinous crime?

Yes! But the killer is one of America's largest coal corporations, Massey Energy Company, and you can't give the death penalty to a corporation. Can you? Well, the Supreme Court has ruled that a corporation is a "person" – so why not?

Massey – headed by its right-wing multimillionaire CEO, Don Blankenship – has spent millions of dollars on lobbyists and lawmakers to fend off any effective regulations to protect mine workers. By using its political clout to muzzle the federal watchdog, Massey has been able to flaunt the law. Last year, it had nearly 500 safety violations in just one of its mines, including life-threatening violations. It's punishment? Fines totaling a mere $168,000 – chump change to an outfit with $56 million in profits last year.

Blankenship blithely says, "We don't pay much attention to the violation count." On April 5, federal inspectors added two more violations to the tally of dangerous indifference at the corporation's Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia. The honchos just shrugged. That afternoon, Upper Big Branch exploded, killing 29 miners.

Blankenship expressed his compassion by saying, "Violations are unfortunately a normal part of the mining process."

Normal? Nonsense! Other major mining nations provide effective regulatory protections to assure that such deaths are abnormal. By putting its profits over human life, America's coal industry is killing people, passing it off as a "cost of doing business." Shouldn't these profiteers pay more than a fine?

One watchdog group is calling for the immediate arrest of Blankenship for homicide. For information go to StopTheChamber.com."

Video - Almost Level, West Virginia

Thanks to Joe Romm for the heads up on this remake of the John Denver classic.

Leveling Appalachia

Could this be the crime of the century? Please watch the video over at Environment 360

"During the last two decades, mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia has destroyed or severely damaged more than a million acres of forest and buried nearly 2,000 miles of streams. Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy of Mountaintop Removal Mining, a video report produced by Yale Environment 360 in collaboration with MediaStorm, focuses on the environmental and social impacts of this practice and examines the long-term effects on the region’s forests and waterways.

At a time when the Obama administration is reviewing mining permit applications throughout West Virginia and three other states, this video offers a first-hand look at mountaintop removal and what is at stake for Appalachia’s environment and its people."

Dirty Coal, at it again!

We've been paying the environmental and health costs of using dirty coal to generate electricity while the dirty coal industry reaps the profits and leaves it's filth for us to clean up. From formerly beautiful appalachian valleys and streams now choked with the blasted refuse of mountaintop removal, to the effects of climate change drying out the west, drowning the east, and threatening to overwhelm our meager attempts to change. And now here we have finally drafted a climate bill, not an ambitious one but a first attempt upon which we can build, and what does the dirty coal industry do? They write a letter, through their humble servants in government of course, to see to it that they continue to be given an out for the damage the cause, they want free permits to emit carbon! What do they think a climate bill is about?

read more over at Care2Causes.

Video - Coal River Mountain, WV: Coal River Wind Project

Where does the electricity you use come from?

"America's Most Endangered Mountains - Coal River Mountain, WV

Pledge to Help End Mountaintop Removal. Visit:
www.iLoveMountains.org"




- - - COMMUNITY STORY - - -

"We don't live where they mine coal. They mine coal where we live.... Our concern today is our homes, our environment, and the sustainability of the environment."

Lorelei Scarbro's house in the little community of Rock Creek, West Virginia is the same house her husband built with his own two hands when they were married, on land handed down to him from his parents. They raised their children in this house. Lorelei watches the deer in the field below, enjoys a fresh mountain stream running by the property and says that her granddaughter takes particular delight in the wild turkeys that frequent the neighborhood. Her husband, a coal miner for 35 years who died of of black lung, is buried in the family cemetery next to their home.

Lorelei's property in Rock Creek borders Coal River Mountain, one of the most beautiful mountains in the Coal River Valley of West Virginia, and one of the few untouched mountains in the region. Miles of pristine creeks and waterfalls, horseback trails and stunning vistas are often overlooked as a prime eco-tourism location.

Now Coal River Mountain is slated for a mountaintop removal coal mine. If the coal company's plans go through, nearly 10 square miles of the mountain will be destroyed, and 18 valley fills will devastate the Coal River watershed.

But residents in the Coal River Valley have joined together to propose a new idea - one of sustainable energy. In 2006, a study of the wind potential on Coal River Mountain demonstrated that the mountain is an ideal location for developing utility-scale wind power.

The proposed Coal River Wild Project would produce enough wind power to keep the lights on in 150,000 homes, pump $20 million per year in direct local spending during construction, and $2 million per year thereafter. It would create hundreds of jobs and allow other uses of the land that would benefit local communities. Sustainable forestry, tourism, and harvesting of ginseng and other wild plants are just a few options for Coal River residents that would ultimately preserve the natural environment of Coal River Mountain for generations to come."

The potential of the US wind resource

Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute and author of Plan B 4.0 (free download) told NPR's Ira Flatow on Science Friday (listen to the whole interview on my audio player above)

"We've known for nearly 20 years now that 3 states, N Dakota, Kansas, and Texas have enough harnessable wind energy, to satisfy not only the national electricity needs but national energy needs."

Is it any wonder BIG oil and dirty coal is spending millions lobbying for protection against climate legislation? Once Manhattan starts going under, after Miami FL, Savannah GA (my home town), the outer banks of the NC are lost to a storm surge on top of sea level rise, when climate refugees are a fact of life not just in Bangladesh but in the US, dirty coal is doomed. Because at that point people will finally realize that using their tumble dryer instead of a clothes line really isn't a sacrifice whereas losing coastal cities certainly is, that growing veggies in an organic garden makes so much more sense than having a petrochemical dumping ground called a lawn. The problem is that by that point it will be too late.

A victory in the courts, but will it stand?

While the big polluters, aka dirty coal, are having success in watering down the climate bill to near irrelevance with their bought and paid for senators, some progress has shown up in the courtroom in New York. As reported over at Climate Progress;

"A federal appeals court ruled Monday that states trying to combat global warming can sue six electric utilities to force them to cut the greenhouse gases emitted by their power plants in 20 states.

You can read the full ruling here. David Hawkins, director of the National Resources Defense Council’s climate programs, told Greenwire (subs. req’d) tonight,

Hawkins added, “The import of this ruling is that failure of Congress or EPA to act on GHG will not immunize emitters from legal action to compel reductions in emissions.”

Take that, delayers!

Again, a federal climate bill would be the best strategy for the country — and the world. But if Congress fails to act — and if fiddlers like Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska block EPA action, then the only place left for recourse will be the courts."

The devastation wrought by dirty coal

There's resource war and then there is resource oppression; when a multinational company is allowed, by corrupt government, to ride roughshod over human rights to extract profits from the ground. Usually perpetrated upon powerless third world populations, now being practiced on the people of the first world as well.

Most of us have heard about the tragic injustices wrought by oil companies Shell, Chevron and Texaco in Ecuador and Nigeria, for profit rape and pillage of the local ecosystem leaving a poisoned dying populace in it's wake. We have learned about the crime that is the tar sands. But how many of us have heard about the same thing happening in the United States?

From West Virginia to Pennsylvania our insatiable hunger for energy has created toxic conditions choking whole valleys, destroying thousands of rivers and streams, and even the local's drinking water. Read more at Care2.com, here's and excerpt; from the post from Jennifer Mueller;

"This past weekend the New York Times covered the story of the Hall-Massey family near Charleston, West Virginia and the toxic chemicals pouring out of the water taps in the family's bathroom and kitchen. The Times reveals a common third-world condition - the lack of safe water for drinking and bathing - facing residents of one of the wealthiest nations in the world. The reporter outlines evidence of a massive failure by state and federal regulators to protect the community of Prenter, lax enforcement of water pollution laws, and yet another consequence of U.S. dependence on fossil fuels for energy.

Because what's polluting this community's water supply? Coal.

Coal Mining Pollution Threatens Drinking Water

Jennifer Hall-Massey and 264 of her neighbors are suing nearby coal mining companies for pumping toxic chemicals into the ground and contaminating their drinking water. "Everything that's in your sludge ponds is in my water, so how can it not be related?" Hall-Massey asks in a video on the Times web site.

Leaking sludge ponds is only one of many ways coal mining can pollute our water. Mountaintop removal mining, blowing the tops off mountains to reveal coal seams and dumping the debris - including numerous toxic heavy metals - into stream beds, is completely legal and common. According to the Sierra Club, more than 1,200 miles of mountain streams have been buried by such waste in Appalachia.

And the effect of underground mining isn't pretty either. Acid drainage from abandon mines pollute streams and groundwater with toxic metals and minerals. Acid drainage has contaminated some 3,000 miles of streams in Pennsylvania alone."

Calculating Coal’s Toll

Here's the transcript from one segment of this weeks episode from the Living on Earth series from PRI. The interviewer is Steve Curwood.

"CURWOOD: But even if it proves to be economical to capture carbon, controversy still dogs coal.

Campaigners – including actress Darryl Hannah and climate scientist James Hansen - have taken their protests to West Virginia's coal country and gotten arrested – why?

HANSEN: First we believe that no child's health and safety are expendable for the expediency of a dirty energy source.

Mountain top removal in West Virginia

HANNAH: First of all to bring attention to the devastating effects of mountain top removal and to make a call for clean renewable infinite energy resources which we have available to us now.

[SHOUTING]

CURWOOD: At the same time, some West Virginians who depend on coal for their livelihoods hollered at the protesters to go back home.

PRO-COAL PROTESTER: They don't like coal, they need to leave our state...

[CHANTING: "GO BACK HOME, GO BACK HOME"]

CURWOOD: But new research from the University of West Virginia suggests those who live and work in mining areas might want to rethink their allegiance to coal.
Michael Hendryx, a researcher in community medicine at West Virginia University has just published a study finding that coal costs a lot more in human terms than it provides in jobs and income.

HENDRYX: We did an analysis that showed that the areas in Appalachia where coal mining takes place actually have the weakest economic circumstances. They have the highest poverty levels, the highest unemployment levels, the lowest income levels. So we followed up that analysis by trying to come up with an estimate of both the cost and the benefits of mining for the Appalachian region and concluded that the costs outweigh the benefits by several factors.

West Virginia coal country. (Courtesy of Michael Hendryx)

CURWOOD: Professor Hendryx, now as I understand it to calculate this you didn't actually look at the costs they spent on health care or lost opportunities but rather you used something that's known as the value of a statistical life, this particular standard. Tell me about that.

HENDRYX: The way that the value of statistical life or VSL is estimated is through I think a pretty ingenious type of a study design where you ask people, "suppose there was an illness that had a one in 10,000 chance of killing you. How much would you be willing to spend yourself to eliminate that risk?" And let's say that people on average in a given study say $600, which a type of a reasonable or typical estimate that people will give. Then ten thousand people together will spend six million to save one life. So it's a way to estimate what society itself values. And we used a range of those estimates and then looked at the number of excess deaths that occur every year in coal mining areas of Appalachia versus non-mining area.

CURWOOD: 10,000 excess deaths.

HENDRYX: That's right. The years 1997 through 2005, translate to over 10,000 excess deaths every year, and we attribute that difference to higher poverty rates in mining area, and also to differences probably in environmental exposures and pollution from activities in the mining industry.

CURWOOD: And if you translate that into money, how much are you talking about?

HENDRYX: One of the estimates that I think is probably most reasonable to use translates into over $42 billion dollars as the human cost of coal mining in Appalachia. Some of the estimates are as high as over $80 billion dollars.

CURWOOD: And how much in the same period of time was the coal economy itself?

HENDRYX: The benefits of the coal economy measured by not only the direct jobs that it creates but the indirect jobs that ripple through the economy as well as the severance taxes that are paid by coal companies came to a little bit over $8 billion dollars a year, much lower than the estimated costs.

CURWOOD: Can you describe a couple of these communities? Paint a picture for us.

HENDRYX: Well, the first image that comes to mind maybe is a town called Whitesville in Boone County. If you drive through the downtown of Whitesville, you'll see that there will be coal dust on the buildings themselves, on the outdoor furniture, on the vehicles. You'll notice a lot of empty storefronts and empty streets and not a lot of business or economic activity taking place. I don't want to pick on one town, but that's the one that comes to mind. I don't want to pick on the people that live there because they're wonderful.

Dust from coal on the side of a house. (Photo: Penny Loeb)

CURWOOD: Now, this isn't a comfortable question to ask, but some would say – look, these communities are very poor, those people might not pay $600 to avoid a one in 10,000 of dying. They don't have any money, they might not pay anything. And the bottom line being, well, human life is maybe worth a lot less in Appalachia in these poor areas.

HENDRYX: Well, I would disagree with that on ethical and moral grounds. But, some people who live there view that their lives are valued less than people who live somewhere else, and that in a way its hard to argue with that. It seems like coal-mining areas in Appalachia are—to us a phrase that's been used "America's Sacrifice Zone" That their lives are expendable so other people somewhere else can have cheap electricity. I find that appalling.

CURWOOD: The federal government's gonna put a lot of money into carbon capture and sequestration from coal fired power plants. How advisable do you think that program is in light of your research?

HENDRYX: I think its one of the dumbest things that they've ever attempted to do. I don't think the evidence is very good that we can implement a scalable carbon capture and storage system that can really be a serious way to deal with CO2 emissions. But even if we could, that addresses only how coal is burned. It doesn't say anything about how it's extracted, processed or transported prior to burning. And carbon capture and storage systems will do nothing to change the conditions in coal mining areas of Appalachia. We have to realize as well that the estimates that come out from the U.S. Geological Survey are that West Virginia will peak in a its coal production in probably less than twenty years. So we really don't have any choice. We can sit around and do nothing and wait for that to happen, or we can begin now to plan and implement serious economic diversification programs. I think that should be a top priority for the state and the nation and even the local community leaders.

CURWOOD: Michael Hendryx is Associate Professor in the Department of Community Medicine at West Virgina University. Thank you so much, Sir.

HENDRYX: Thank you."

Fear and loathing fighting Big Dirty Coal

For the sake of a few jobs are we really willing to sacrifice mountain communities and the very mountains the live on? Here's an update on the situation in West Virginia as reported by Ben Block over on World Changing.

Here's an excerpt;

"Maria Gunnoe raises her children in a small town in the Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia. Her grandfather toiled for 32 years in the coal mines to buy the property where she lives. She helped build the house that her son and daughter now call home.

Five years ago, a flood unlike anything her ancestors experienced nearly wiped Gunnoe's home off the map. A spring rain turned the docile Big Branch Creek that transects her yard into a barrage of black water. The flood ripped Gunnoe's Rottweiler from his collar and carried him downstream. Her family stayed indoors, praying the house would withstand the current.

"There is nothing more intimidating than a 60-foot-wide, 20-foot-tall wall of water coming at you," said Gunnoe, whose property has flooded seven times in the past nine years. She blames the 486 hectare (1,200-acre) mountaintop removal mine that has been leveling the ridge above her home.

Gunnoe, who was honored last month with the 2009 Goldman Environment Prize for North America, has become one of the most fearless opponents of mountaintop removal in her state. Her campaign against the powerful coal industry has helped attract international attention to the damaging mining practice. ... "The people of Appalachia are being sacrificed for energy in this country," said Gunnoe, a grassroots organizer with the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition (OVEC). "The work I do with fighting mountaintop removal coal mining was inspired because I am a mother. I do not and will never support any aspect of the coal industry, simply because I've seen it kill people I care about."...

OVEC sued the Army Corps of Engineers in 2007 to stop any new mining at a mountaintop removal site near Gunnoe's home town of Bob White. Days before the hearing, Gunnoe gathered 20 local residents who were scheduled to join her in testifying against the mine site. But more than 60 coal miners also showed up at the community hall to harass the protestors to stay silent.

The day of the testimony, more than 100 people packed the courtroom, with a divided gallery split between miners and
environmentalists. Among the community witnesses, Gunnoe was the only resident willing to challenge the industry directly.

Her testimony helped sway U.S. District Judge Robert C. Chambers to rule in the coalition's favor. "Money can be earned, lost, and earned again," Chambers wrote. "But a valley once filled is gone forever."

The mining company involved in the lawsuit released a notice stating that the ruling could result in job losses for at least 39 miners at the site and another 180 at a related underground mine. Soon, Gunnoe found her face across her community on "wanted" posters labeled "Job Hater." A neighborhood store started collecting signatures for a petition against Gunnoe. Her daughter's dog was shot dead.

Friends heard rumors that Gunnoe too would be shot, and that her home would be burned with her children inside." - Ben Block

US may never again need to build a new coal or nuclear power plant.

Thanks to OpenAlex for this tidbit.

"The chairman of the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has stated that the US may never again need to build a new coal or nuclear power plant. He argues that smarter grids along with better storage for renewables will make new conventional baseload capacity unnecessary. Many people have made the argument before. But its sure was a surprise to see it coming from such a highly placed official in the US government. " -Alex Aylett

read more

Powered by Coal on 60 minutes

EPA halts permitting of mountaintop removal mining

"I just want to celebrate...."!
"MTR takes place in the Southeast Appalachian Region, located in the states of West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a report in 2003 about MTR. Between 1985 and 2001, over seven percent of Appalachian forests were wiped out and 1,200 streams were either polluted or buried according to the report. An area equal in size to one-quarter of New York City or San Francisco, 800 square miles, was estimated to be destroyed in Appalachia. It is high time we saw an end to such a thoroughly damaging industry. " - Gina-Marie Cheeseman on Celsias

Long overdue, the Environmental Protection Agency has halted permitting of mountaintop removal coal mining. We've sacrificed large swathes of the Appalachian ecosystem, mountain communities to ash spills, health and quality of life in the area to truck traffic, explosive noise, and dust intrusion. All to satiate our unending greed for cheap energy to fuel wasteful consumerist lifestyles. The Bush administration encouraged this behaviour to insure our addictive ways, remember his advice to "go shopping", and blocked every attempt to behave responsibly towards the precious natural resources and heritage of Appalchia.

Now, a breath of fresh air is blowing away the coal sludge encrusted lobbyists and fat cats from the seats of power. After a review of the science on the impacts of MTR the EPA will decide how best proceed.

Thanks to Gina-Marie Cheeseman on Celsias for the image.

Yes We Must!

As scientists warn that we are fast running out of time to prevent runaway climate change (a global challenge that dwarfs this financial crisis both in size and importance, literally and singularly too big to fail), naysayers claim that the Obama administration is trying to do too much, talking heads and pundits on corporate media are saying we need to slow down on developing a smart grid, and the politicians that are owned by the lobbyists and corporate interests that have created the multipronged mess we are in do everything in their power to remain firmly stuck in the toxic coal waste mud oozing through the towns of Appalachia, President Obama is forging ahead with plans to rebuild the economy on the technologies of the future and put the world on a path towards sustainability. I may not agree with everything he is doing but I am willing to give him leeway to put a plan in place and will continue to try to influence the process through contact with my states' politicians and petitions to the Congress, Senate, and White House. In the meantime is incumbent upon us all to personally reduce wasteful consumerism, increase energy efficiency, invest in sustainability, fight dirty coal and reduce driving (the chief culprits in global warming), and further reduce our carbon footprint by eating local and organic. This isn't about Can Do it is about Must Do.

Here's excerpts from Obama's speech at the SCE Electric Vehicle Technical Center in California as reported on Climate Progress,

"... our greatest discoveries are born not in a flash of brilliance, but in the crucible of a deliberate effort over time. And often, they take something more than imagination and dedication alone — often they take an investment from government. That’s how we sent a man to the moon. That’s how we were able to launch a world wide web. And it’s how we’ll build the clean energy economy that’s the key to our competitiveness in the 21st century.

We’ll do this because we know that the nation that leads on energy will be the nation that leads the world in the 21st century. That’s why, around the world, nations are racing to lead in these industries of the future. Germany is leading the world in solar power. Spain generates almost 30 percent of its power by harnessing the wind, while we manage less than one percent. And Japan is producing the batteries that currently power American hybrid cars.

So the problem isn’t a lack of technology. You’re producing the technology right here. The problem is that, for decades, we have avoided doing what must be done as a nation to turn challenge into opportunity. As a consequence, we import more oil today than we did on 9/11. The 1908 Model T earned better gas mileage than a typical SUV sold in 2008. And even as our economy has been transformed by new forms of technology, our electric grid looks largely the same as it did half a century ago.

So we have a choice to make. We can remain one of the world’s leading importers of foreign oil, or we can make the investments that will allow us to become the world’s leading exporter of renewable energy. We can let climate change continue to go unchecked, or we can help stem it. We can let the jobs of tomorrow be created abroad, or we can create those jobs right here in America and lay the foundation for our lasting prosperity.

... In the next three years, we will double this nation’s supply of renewable energy. We have also made the largest investment in basic research funding in American history — an investment that will spur not only new discoveries in energy, but breakthroughs in science and technology."

Mr. Coal Waste goes to Washington

This time it's 4000 gallons of toxic coal ash slurry from a ruptured pipeline flowing directly into the Potomac. Read more at NRDC Switchboard
The image of the Potomac is from Google maps via the NRDC switchboard site which is organizing citizens to track the spill on it's way to Washington.

Thanks to 1Sky on Twitter for the heads up.

Coal: Cleanup, Costs, and Consequences in Tennessee | Use Celsias.com - reduce global °Celsius

" A billion gallons of sludge.

A possible $800 million price tag for the cleanup.

A lawsuit against the Tennessee Valley Authority.

So far in Tennessee, this is just some of the fallout from the 300-acre Kingston Steam Plant coal ash spill in December as concerns over heavy metal pollution and health effects from the accident are increasing. The environmental disaster has fast become a public relations one for the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), too, as grassroots and netroots groups report evidence of arsenic and other toxins in the area's water."
- Amy Anaruk on Celsias

I posted on this when it happened and going on the assumption that you are not going to hear about the fallout on mainstream media, considering I didn't hear a word about the coal protest at the capital recently on CNN, NBC, CBS, or ABC, here is a followup on the situation over on Celsias.

Coal: Cleanup, Costs, and Consequences in Tennessee

Posted using ShareThis

Coen Brothers chip in to stop dirty coal.

Today is the day. Stop Dirty Coal!

Along with thousands of others including James Hansen, Wendell Berry and Gus Speth, Bill McKibben is putting his freedom on the line to protest dirty coal. Stand in solidarity with them. Here is a message from Bill McKibben;

"Dear Friends,

There are moments in a nation's--and a planet's--history when it may be necessary for some to break the law in order to bear witness to an evil, bring it to wider attention, and push for its correction.

Today is one of those days.

In a few hours, the first big protest of the Obama era -- and the largest-ever civil disobedience against global warming in this country -- will take place against the not-very-scenic backdrop of the coal-fired Capitol Hill Power Plant in Washington DC.

Myself and people of every stripe will be risking arrest today, and I'm asking you to stand with me as it unfolds. Please stand with the thousands gathering today in DC, and show the world that people everywhere are uniting behind a future free of coal--a future safe from the ravages of climate change.

Click here to stand in solidarity with this action: http://www.350.org/Coal-Free/

Here's the statement you'll be signing onto:

---

I share your vision of a coal-free future and a safe climate, not only in Washington DC--but all over the world. I stand in solidarity with the coalition of citizens working for a clean energy future for the entire planet.

---

You also have the option to add your personal statements of solidarity with the activists on the ground. We're trying to show as much support as possible in the next few hours--can you sign on now? http://www.350.org/Coal-Free/

With President Obama and a new US Congress, there is more possibility for climate action than ever before. It really feels like the U.S. is close to a breakthrough--and this protest can help create the political space a breakthrough requires.

Here's the backstory: Washington DC has seen its share of big protests over the years, and most of them center on the White House, the Mall or the Capitol.

But today's event is just a few blocks a way from the White House at the the Capitol Power Plant--a dirty symbol of the dirtiest business on Earth, the combustion of coal.

In that one plant -- owned and operated by our senators and representatives -- you can see all the filth that comes with coal. There are the particulates it spews into the air and hence the lungs of those Washington residents who enjoy breathing. There are the profits it hands to the coal industry, which is literally willing to level mountains across West Virginia and Kentucky to increase its fat margins. And most of all there is the invisible carbon dioxide it spews each day into the atmosphere, drying our forests, melting our glaciers and acidifying our oceans.

The power plant is only a symbol, of course -- a lunch counter or a bus station in the fight for environmental justice. We'll sit down at its gates for a single afternoon, but the message is much larger: it's time to start figuring out how to shut down every coal-fired plant on the planet. Success won't come right away because we're up against some of the world's richest corporations, but we have to start turning this tanker around someday, and tomorrow is that day.

Again, our efforts will be greatly helped if you stand in solidarity with this action: http://www.350.org/Coal-Free/

This may seem like an odd time to take to the streets -- after all, the new administration has done more in a month to fight global warming than all the presidents of the past 20 years. But in fact, it's the perfect moment. For one thing, our leaders may actually listen -- in the anti-science years of the Bush administration, global warming activists concentrated their work on state capitols, knowing that the federal government would never budge. Now, if we demonstrate that there's real public pressure, we may give the Democratic Congress and the White House some room to act.

More to the point, the time not to act is running out. Climate science has grown steadily darker in the past 18 months, ever since the rapid melt of Arctic sea ice in the summer of 2007 showed scientists that change was coming faster than they'd reckoned.

That message was underlined recently at the Washington meetings of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, when Stanford researcher Christopher Field said: "We are basically looking now at a future climate that's beyond anything we've considered seriously in climate model simulations." Our foremost climatologist, NASA's James Hansen, has given that future a number -- any level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere beyond 350 parts per million, his team has demonstrated, is "incompatible with the planet on which civilization developed."

Since we're already past that number -- the carbon dioxide level is at 387 parts per million -- the fight is on. Indeed, by Hansen's calculation, the world will need to be out of the coal-burning business by 2030, and the West much sooner than that, if we're ever going to get back to 350. It's no accident that NASA's James Hansen announced he'll be on hand to get arrested. So will Gus Speth, who ran the United Nations Development Programme, and the farmer and author Wendell Berry who has seen the devastation of his native Kentucky.

And maybe most heartening, I'll be joined by over a thousand college students who will have just come from lobbying in the halls of Congress for clean energy. They'll have just wrapped up PowerShift '09--an climate convergence organized by a separate coaltion that promises to be a historic catalyst in this movement. These two complimentary tactics are a very good sign: a healthy movement is like a healthy ecosystem--marked by spectacular diversity. There are many ways to be a climate activist--lobbying, rallying, educating, and on and on and on. For me--today at least--being a climate activist means risking arrest with civil disobedience.

Getting the planet off coal -- getting the planet back to 350 -- will be the main political and economic challenge for the lifetimes of those college students. Those of us who are older won't live long enough to see the final victory, but we can help get it started, by lobbying, by writing e-mails -- and by sitting down in the street on an afternoon in March.

Please join me,

Bill McKibben

P.S. Please forward this message far and wide. If your friends and family share a vision for coal-free, clean energy future safe from climate change--and I'm quite sure at least some of them do--ask them to sign our solidarity statement by clicking here: http://www.350.org/coal-free/"

Protest Dirty Coal Energy, Tomorrow

Electricity produced from coal is the biggest source of global warming gases on the planet. There is no disputing that. We must stop burning coal!

What are you doing tomorrow, March 2nd? If you can get to DC please join the thousands who will be protesting dirty coal at the Congressional power plant. read more.....

James Hansen: The Sword of Damocles from Celsias.com

Dr. James Hansen speaking plainly again.
Here's an excerpt;

"Coal is not only the largest fossil fuel reservoir of carbon dioxide, it is the dirtiest fuel. Coal is polluting the world’s oceans and streams with mercury, arsenic and other dangerous chemicals.

The dirtiest trick that governments play on their citizens is the pretense that they are working on “clean coal” or that they will build power plants that are “capture ready” in case technology is ever developed to capture all pollutants.

The trains carrying coal to power plants are death trains. Coal-fired power plants are factories of death. When I testified against the proposed Kingsnorth power plant, I estimated that in its lifetime it would be responsible for extermination of about 400 species – its proportionate contribution to the number that would be committed to extinction if carbon dioxide rose another 100 ppm. ... On a per capita basis, the three countries most responsible for fossil fuel carbon dioxide in the air today are the United Kingdom, the United States, and Germany, in that order. Politicians in Britain have asked me: why am I speaking to them — the United States must lead? But coal interests have great power in the United States – the essential moratorium and phase-out of coal likely requires a growing public demand and a political will yet to be demonstrated."

James Hansen: The Sword of Damocles

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