Public Lab Wiki documentation

New clean air regulations a diminishing supply of cleaner coal meant new techniques of washing coal were introduced, leaving the Clean Water Act-prohibited toxins in multi-billion-gallon toxic sludge impoundments throughout Appalachia, burying headwater streams, forests and history.

In the town of Sundial, Marsh Fork Elementary School sits 400 yards downslope from one such impoundment: the leaky 385-foot-high Shumates Branch earthen dam, which holds back 2.8 billion gallons of coal sludge. The school also sits below Massey subsidiary Independence Coal's 1,849-acre Edwight mountaintop removal mine and is 225 feet from the coal silo at the Goals Coal Preparation Plant—another Massey subsidiary. Children at the school are frequently sick and asthma is high on the list. The prep plant releases chemical-laden coal dust that independent studies have shown to be prevalent in the school.

Local residents have been asking the school board and the governor's office through multiple channels to move the school to a healthy location within the community, but have so far met only resistance. Partly in response to that resistance, they started the Pennies of Promise campaign on May 30, 2006, to raise the money for a new school. Work is also afoot to transition the area's economy away from coal to something healthier and sustainable. A wind farm on Coal River Mountain, for example, would provide jobs for longer, more local tax revenue from industry and a healthier place for kids than MTR would.

Unfortunately, a mountaintop removal mine on Coal River Mountain would destroy over 60 percent of the potential wind turbine sites. Coal has been the cornerstone of the economy for more than 100 years. One of the best things available to replace coal in West Virginia's economy, wind, is being destroyed by King Coal's desperate attempts at survival. The past is trying to destroy the future.

Some residents want mountaintop removal ended, a new school built within the community for the kids at Marsh Fork Elementary and for Massey to be run off. They want access to the mountains that have sustained their families for generations and to be treated like human beings.

New clean air regulations a diminishing supply of cleaner coal meant new techniques of washing coal were introduced, leaving the Clean Water Act-prohibited toxins in multi-billion-gallon toxic sludge impoundments throughout Appalachia, burying headwater streams, forests and history.

In the town of Sundial, Marsh Fork Elementary School sits 400 yards downslope from one such impoundment: the leaky 385-foot-high Shumates Branch earthen dam, which holds back 2.8 billion gallons of coal sludge. The school also sits below Massey subsidiary Independence Coal's 1,849-acre Edwight mountaintop removal mine and is 225 feet from the coal silo at the Goals Coal Preparation Plant—another Massey subsidiary. Children at the school are frequently sick and asthma is high on the list. The prep plant releases chemical-laden coal dust that independent studies have shown to be prevalent in the school.

Local residents have been asking the school board and the governor's office through multiple channels to move the school to a healthy location within the community, but have so far met only resistance. Partly in response to that resistance, they started the Pennies of Promise campaign on May 30, 2006, to raise the money for a new school. Work is also afoot to transition the area's economy away from coal to something healthier and sustainable. A wind farm on Coal River Mountain, for example, would provide jobs for longer, more local tax revenue from industry and a healthier place for kids than MTR would.

Unfortunately, a mountaintop removal mine on Coal River Mountain would destroy over 60 percent of the potential wind turbine sites. Coal has been the cornerstone of the economy for more than 100 years. One of the best things available to replace coal in West Virginia's economy, wind, is being destroyed by King Coal's desperate attempts at survival. The past is trying to destroy the future.

Some residents want mountaintop removal ended, a new school built within the community for the kids at Marsh Fork Elementary and for Massey to be run off. They want access to the mountains that have sustained their families for generations and to be treated like human beings.