Spill at Tennessee Coal Plant Creates Environmental Disaster worse than EXXON VALDESE!

[KoKo]

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/24/spill_at_tennessee_coal_plant_creates
Tvaweb

Parts of Tennessee remain buried under toxic sludge today after a major disaster at a coal plant. A forty-acre pond containing toxic coal ash has collapsed, spilling out millions of gallons of coal ash. Environmentalists say the spill is more than thirty times larger than the Exxon Valdez, but the story has received little national attention. Greenpeace is calling for a criminal investigation.
Tvaweb

SEE MORE at......

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/24/spill_at_tennessee_coal_plant_creates

[varelse]

1. "Clean" coal?

*sigh*

[monmouth]

2. You took the words right out of my head...LOL....n/t

[KoKo]

3. Our Weather Folks here in North Carolina always list "particulates" as our Primary Source of Air

Pollution..and in the Summer..OZONE ALERTS take over. :shrug:

The Guy at the end of the interview sort of addresses what we here in NC live with. We have huge Asthma problems here in the land of the "TALL PINES."

It's hard to know the "truth of anything" these days but listening to all sides takes time...but might be worth it..for our kids and our own health.... Just Saying...

[pitohui]

11. asthma is huge there and in later life it means heart disease

i could rant on for hours here, don't get me started

[Jamastiene]

15. Yes, that and Charlotte's inadequate mass transit system...

among other pollutants.

We have FAR TOO MAY days of dangerous ozone levels in this state. Our health is going to continue deteriorate for years to come due to that fact. It sickens me.

[BrklynLiberal]

6. An imaginary proecess that exists only in the minds of the coal industry executives.

http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/articles/2008/clean_coal_lie.php
"Clean Coal" Is a Lie
Hold on to your wallets as big coal lobbies government for taxpayer subsidies

This is a great "clean coal" ad....Watch it.
http://www.thisisreality.org/#/?p=facility

[crikkett]

16. "clean coal" my ash!

[BrklynLiberal]

4. The same exact thing happened in West Virginia in 2002. there was a documentary about it on TV

Today..

The people of Appalachia have been fighting for years against the coal mining interests, the mountaintop removal coal mining and the HUGE slurry ponds{impoundment}that the processing of this coal causes.

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/mar2002/2002-03-15-03.asp

"The audacity of Massey to initially blame the slurry spill on ‘an act of God' was a prime example of the company's callous attitude," said Roberts. "The safety of that impoundment was questioned back in 1999, and Massey should have responded to those concerns. But it didn't respond, and thousands of citizens throughout Appalachia are still paying the price."

http://earth.google.com/outreach/cs_app_voices.html

Appalachia Mountaintop Removal

Mountaintop removal coal mining is changing the American landscape on a scale that is hard to comprehend unless you see it from the air. Anyone who has ever flown in a small aircraft over southern West Virginia or eastern Kentucky will never forget the experience of seeing the massive scale of destruction - mountain after mountain blown up and dumped into valleys as far as the eye can see.

Mountaintop removal affects more than mountains and streams, however; it is threatening to displace and destroy a distinctly American culture that has persisted in the Appalachian Mountains for generations. Appalachian people working to save their communities have long dreamed of ways to fly reporters, decision-makers, and thousands of other Americans over the Appalachian coalfields to see this destruction first hand - and then to visit their communities to hear stories of people who endure the consequences of what some have called "cheap energy."

From The Encyclopedia of White Collar Crime:
http://books.google.com/books?id=tumxfktlYFAC&pg=PA178&lpg=PA178&dq=West+virginia+slurry+pond+spill,+coal+mining&source=web&ots=YJ5MT7I1Vp&sig=k5jnjm-LV0vCaOkQiW58GQiFIVw&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=4&ct=result

[KoKo]

5. That's why I'm focusing on Obama's Pick for FCC CHAIR as his MOST IMPORTANT!

Without a REAL, FAIR, and DOGGED "MEDIA FOR TRUTH"..his Administration will go the way of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton.

If Obama didn't notice...I hope Michelle did! Michelle is my true hope for this new Administration...she "GETS IT!" But, she is as able to be "Corrupted" as the rest..given the times wse live in. Still...I look to HER!

[BrklynLiberal]

8. That WV sludge flood was over 6 years ago. I doubt if any of the major media covered it.

The documentary was heartbreaking..

The people who have lived there for generations were saying that it never occurred to them that they needed to take pictures of the mountains in order to remember them. They had figured that a mountain is forever...

The pictures of what was left after mountaintop removal, and the slurry spill was horrendous...beyond description.

[KoKo]

10. Did you read the OP about the latest Toxic Sludge Dump" This is NW and not 6 yrs Ago!

Okay?

[BrklynLiberal]

24. I read. I am saying that it is not the first one...and the people have been fighting against this

kind of thing for decades...

[earth mom]

7. OMFG! Maybe this will show Obama that coal is NOT the way to go!

:grr:

[pitohui]

9. coal fucking kills

but the media is happy to pretend that heart disease is caused by diet and lifestyle choices and to ignore the role played by coal, i don't even expect them to report on something like this when year after year they ignore the fact that "clean coal" air pollution causes many cases of heart disease and cancer among non smokers in the tennessee river valley

i go so far as to say if you exercise daily outdoors in knoxville tenn you WILL need bypass surgery, and those who kid themselves it can't happen to them because they don't smoke are the most bitter when it does

[KoKo]

13. Most of you are too young to remember how Coal Burning Stoves...Smoked up your Houses

and to clean it off your walls for burning it required "Heavy Duty Stuff" to scrub it down, yearly.

I wish all our Tombstoned Oldies were here to talk about what it was like to "grow up with COAL"...lumps and rocks of it...when times were tough after WWII!

[Jamastiene]

19. I am not that old, but I did live in a house that had once used

coal. Those homes get an unmistakable sooty appearance no matter how much cleaning people tried to do. Most of the homes in the neighborhood where I grew up and still live (albeit just down the street) still have remnants of truckloads of coal in the yards. There is burnt coal in my yard. The original house (the homes built in this neighborhood were built in 1882) burned down a few years back, but remnants of coal use are still in my yard.

My aunt tells me a lot of what it was like and how thankful poor people were to be able to have it, but yes, it was super super messy to the nth degree. I don't see how there could be such a thing as "clean coal." Just picking up an old used rock of it when I was a kid "dusted" me with the leftover soot. I can only imagine what it would have been like. I certainly do not envy that era at all.

[SoCalDem]

26. My grandmother's house had a coal chute

I think they quit using coal in the 40's.. My aunt remembered snitching coal to write on the sidewalks:)

[Ghost in the Machine]

12. This happened about 25 miles from my house...

I live 5 minutes from Watts Bar Dam at the lower end of the reservoir (Watts Bar Lake). I'll be keeping an eye on this story, especially since I get my water from my own well... hopefully it won't affect it.

Peace,

Ghost

[KoKo]

14. Thanks for your "birds eye view." Please keep us posted when it all comes "down river."

In these dark times...we are all: "DOWN RIVER" from everything.. :-(

If one takes enough time to think about it all...all of us in the SAME BOAT..trashed and scrabbling, scrambling...

[Ghost in the Machine]

17. I may have to take a ride tomorrow... check out the dam, then a few spots I know upriver...

I'll look for signs of a fish kill. Too bad I don't have the money to go investigate by boat... I only took it out once this year... and that's because someone else paid for the gas. I've been trying to sell it for over a year...

[KoKo]

20. Well...do what you can and thanks..

[KoKo]

23. Maybe like Pete Seeger got funding to clean up NY's Hudson River...we

could start a fund to support "River Keepers" all over America. Particularly those who are familiar with the land and know it from growing up there.

I'd like to see some of our Enviro Funds focus on this..but they seem to be more Global Centric.

Folks here on DU who have skills and learned from growing up where they were who have "horse sense" are the ones we might need to focus on. Although, when it comes to funding...usually some sycophantic kid of a Prominent Family favored by the Governor get's the jobs...and they are Political Appointments..so that the info that comes out always favors the "pet project or interest" of the "party in power."

That said...guiding the Environmental groups many of us here on DU support into "Local USA ...Clean Up America Efforts" might be the way we could move forward with "Grass Roots Supprt" that is overwhelming once folks know the danger USA/America is in after Bush/Cheney have pillaged it.

Just saying...:shrug:

[intheflow]

29. The Waterkeeper Alliance may already have a local chapter in your area.

http://www.waterkeeper.org/mainwaterkeepers.aspx

It doesn't look like there's a member organization in the OP's area:(, but Robert Kennedy, Jr. is the chair of this national alliance as he the vice chair of Riverkeeper in the Hudson Valley. I worked with a member group in Mississippi, they were a great group of people to work with. The alliance provides some backup and muscle for legal disputes (like suing the companies responsible for the environmental damage) and public policy making.

[KoKo]

31. Where I live now in NC that went BLUE for OBAMA ( I might add) does have some River Keepers

that we support. ENO RIVER Festival in Durham, NC is an active group that has many festivals with activities for kids to keep the movement alive that started in the late 60's

There are others. We need to find the groups doing this in our states across America and get INVOLVED or support with a dollar or two or TIME if one doesn't have money.

[NashVegas]

18. The Tennessean Is Blogging "Narrative" Storytelling And Wondering Why National Media Is Ignoring It

Damn Gannet is telling campfire tales again and wondering why no one takes it seriously.

[KoKo]

21. We don't have any media that cares about "the rest of us anymore." Would that be it?

:-( The final legacy of Bush/Cheney the KILLERS who destroyed and left everything in their path devastated...took away the only voices who could report on it..by co-opting them to their own side. Nepotism and Inside Beltway under Bush/Cheney reached a Pinnacle.

Without the Internet we would all be subservient by now. Just lapping and sucking up what their "propaganda machine" spewed out through the likes of Karen Hughes (Chimperor-in-Chief's Fifth Grade Buddy) and we'd all be giving up our last dollars to SAVE THE PLANET to keep SPREADING "FEEDOM AND DEMOCRACY for the BFEE and their THINK THANK "hangers on ..who are just pigs feeding at teat of you and our Taxpayer Dollars!" :-(

[NashVegas]

22. Well, Jebus, It's Just Some Tennessee Hicks, You Know ...

the latest ....

http://tennessean.com/article/20081224/GREEN0201/812240420

[KoKo]

25. Reading that on Christmas Eve...is very sad..

Or for anyone whatever their beliefs are non-belief's are.. These people have been screwed over and over and kept ignorant and undereducated and maybe they are okay being who they are. After all..an awful lot of "over-educated" folks from Ivy League and MBA Programs held in high regard..got us where we are today...on the backs of the rest of us and the coal miners and auto workers, truck drivers, service workers and the rest of us shut out by the FINACIAL CRIMINALITY of AMERICA's RULING CLASS.

Thanks for the post...and it's sad to see this...like Appalachia before the "New Deal." Folks back to the 1930s. Same old...Same old... When will we ever learn to take care of our "own people."

[malaise]

27. Saw a clip on CNN earlier

today. This is HUGE!!!

[RiverStone]

28. Wonder why this disaster is hiding in plain sight?

Saw a brief story; it showed 12 houses affected by the slide. There was no mention as to the gravity or depth of this man-made disaster.

Thanks for sharing!

K&R

[Chulanowa]

33. Two reasons

Vested interests and location.

The media will not say anything about coal. It's the new old jesus. I was just wondering what "clean Coal" ads were doing on DU... now i guess I know.

Second, as others have pointed out, it's Tennessee. I've got roots up that way, so I know better, but a lot of people, when they thing Appalachia, they think Granny Clampett and Deliverance.

[Elwood P Dowd]

30. NBC Nightly News did a story on it tonight at 6:30 EST.

I just caught part of it, so I need to check their site and watch the entire segment.

[KoKo]

32. Thanks...we need to check out the site. I know CNN seems to be trying to do some Enviro reporting..

but, I'm always suspect of the funding in the Major Media these days..wondering who the funders support..and how they can get Media Reports on Cables and Elsewhere that "other groups" can't. Still...the more exposure to the environmental problems we face the better, IMHO...wherever the funding comes from ...for now.

[knitter4democracy]

34. Oh my goodness!

Well, thank goodness we have a federal government ready and willing to run in there and clean it up and . . . oh. Crap. Never mind.