mountaintop removal

An interview with ‘Green Nobel’ winner Maria Gunnoe

Mountaintop, removed. Near Rawl, West Virginia.Courtesy of ILoveMountains.orgMaria Gunnoe.Tom DusenberyWest Virginian Maria Gunnoe won a prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize this week for her work fighting the devastating practice of mountaintop removal mining. It’s hard to think of someone more deserving of the prize, which includes a $150,000 award. Gunnoe, 40, has seen her family’s ancestral […]

King coal takedown: Maria Gunnoe

Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living” — Mother Jones. Maria Gunnoe is one of seven recipients of the 2009 Goldman Environmental PrizePhoto: Tom DusenberyListen here, King Coal. Maria “Mother” Gunnoe, a fearless community organizer for the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition in West Virginia, whose home sits on the frontlines of […]

Gunnoe gets Goldman

Proud to say that one of the Orion Grassroots Network’s own, Maria Gunnoe, an organizer for Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, has won the “environmental nobel” for her courageous grassroots activism to end mountaintop removal (MTR) in the face of fierce intimidation: Grist’s own Ken Ward has the story in today’s Charleston (WV) Gazette. Maria Gunnoe […]

No stinkin’ green jobs or responsible mining debate!

For all of her “drill, baby, drill” cheerleading, at least Governor Sarah Palin is willing to have a discussion about renewable energy sources like wind and geothermal. According to the Coal River Wind Project, the West Virginia House of Delegates Speaker Rick Thompson and a handful of House Rules Committee members have just blocked a […]

Where's the national outrage on Blair Mountain?

When Walmart recently announced its intention to build a super-center near the Wilderness Battlefield in Virginia, filmmaker Ken Burns and a host of Pulitzer Prize-winning historians denounced the move for its obvious offense to our national heritage site.

We need that same outrage for another battlefield under assault.

A plea to West Virginia’s legendary Senator to stop mountaintop removal

With daily ammonium nitrate/fuel oil explosions from mountaintop removal operations rocking his home and dismantling the mountain above his community, Bo Webb, a Vietnam vet, recently penned an appeal to his West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd to co-sponsor the Appalachian Mountain Restoration Act to stop mountaintop removal and launch a green jobs initiative in Appalachia. […]

Grammy stars unite on new campaign

  Rob Perks at the Natural Resources Defense Council has just unveiled a wonderful website tribute to Grammy Award-winning country and rock musicians banding together to stop mountaintop removal in Appalachia. Featuring Kathy Mattea, Emmylou Harris, Sheryl Crow and Big Kenny Alphin, the Music Saves Mountains campaign is a great reminder of the indisputable role […]

Jack Spadaro Needs to Rescue MSHA and OSM

Jack Spadaro is a singular figure in the mining world. With nearly 40 years of experience as a mine safety engineer and expert, Spadaro is one of those very rare government regulators who is revered alike by miners and coalfield citizens for his meticulous commitment to safety, health and environmental standards in the coalfields. On […]

EPA issues clarification on mountaintop removal notice

One can only wonder whether the following EPA statement regarding its move on mountaintop removal was prompted by some angry phone calls to the agency from certain influential West Virginia lawmakers. In any event, here’s what the EPA sent out late Tuesday: Following reports that mischaracterize actions taken by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), […]