The Appalachian Mountains are home to many different species of birds, animals, and trees. Strip mining consists of blowing away the mountain summits destroying the homes of many animals as well as people on the depths below. In the book, Eric Reece talks about a 5,000 page document explaining why strip mining is bad for the environment. In it states that it bad because it buries head water streams, causes erosion and flooding, degrades water quality downstream, kills aquatic life, shakes walls and cracks of foundation of homes, and wipes out huge portions of diverse ecosystems. Since there are not very many laws against how the strip mining companies are allowed to collect the coal below people’s land, they decide to do it the cheapest and easiest way they know how, and that is to blast it out of the mountains and collect it after. Along with the animals and the people that live in the depths below are the streams and wells that flow for the people who live there. These streams and wells allow for safe drinking water. Due to the water is being contaminated by the coal mining companies, people have died from cancer and other illnesses by drinking this nasty water.
The opposing argument for mining the coal are that it allows for a lower unemployment rate in the areas, it allows for flat land to establish housing and businesses, and it will draw investors into the state for new business ventures. Though some houses and businesses were built on these newly flat lands, most of the areas remain vacant because of the poor nutrition in the soil and water.
After reading the first portion of the book, I think that coal mining does much harm to not only the environment and wildlife, but also to the people who live in those areas where coal is being extracted. Yeah it does all these things in that area, but I want to raise this question… If not there, then where? I think that if it’s not going to be in Kentucky, then it’s just going to happen somewhere else. Like the previous websites said, coal is our most cost efficient and abundant form of energy. So we must get it somewhere…
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I think that your point of view is correct when talking about if its not happening there then it will just happen somewhere else. I feel for the people who have to live in this area and i know it would hard for them to just pick up and move away, but most of them have been living with this their entire life and know what is going to happen. If i lived there i would think really hard about moving out of this area where i can live a normal life without thinking of the water quality every time i take a drink. I understand though that is easier said then done.
ReplyDeleteI think the point that you make holds true to a point. While we need to utilize coal, we as a country have become overly dependent upon coal as a resource. It's the classic problem of believing that a finite resource is somehow infinite.
ReplyDeleteWe must develop better ways of creating renewable resources in order to power our homes instead of lazily casting aside the problems of pollution in order to have the next generation try to wrap its head around it.
I agree with the point you make about the correlation between the contaminated water and the people who die of cancer. Also you bring up another great point about how the land is left vacant and unused. I believe it is important to see that once this land is basically scalped it cannot be reused or considered "real estate".
ReplyDeleteI agree that there needs to be much more regulation on the restoration of the mining sites. It's so wasteful to simply leave a bare spot of land on the top of a mountain without at least allowing for wildlife and plant life to continue. If we aren't going to restore, then there should be something that humans can benefit from like a Wind plant that would create jobs and collect tons of wind at that high of an altitude. This would definitely be costly to start off, but the benefits in the end would be great. The problem with this is finding people that want to invest in land that is deemed so terrible. Whatever the solution is, something needs to be done in the benefit of the people that live there, or at least to the surrounding environment.
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