Credit for the picture goes to http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/After the most recent tragic mining accident in Kentucky, only weeks after the terrible one in West Virginia, I couldn't help but to think back to a presentation by Jeff Biggers I attended a few weeks ago.
In mid-April, I attended (and presented at) the Campus Community Partnerships for Systainability conference in Lexington, KY (http://www.greencampusky.org/). Without a doubt, one of the highlights of the conference was Jeff Biggers' keynote presentation, Coal Free Future Begins in Kentucky.
Poetic, articulate, passionate, a truly powerful storyteller, Jeff was terrific pounding the pulpit, sermonizing on the high cost of coal.
Stories of families destroyed, communities empoverished, environments decimated, and an account of how little life is valued when safety and nature go up against profit. Not that any of it was really a revelation for those of us for whom "clean coal" is among the worse oxymorons in existence. But Jeff's talents in creating the emotional connection to the issue, to the cause, is truly something to experience.
And the fact of the matter is, he's right. Coal is the crack cocaine of our addiction to fossil fuel. Between mountaintop removal, black lung disease, lack of consideration of worker safety, the destruction of local ecosystems, GHG emissions from coal plants, coal mine "accidents", particulate in the air, and the empoverishing economic dependency communities develop on coal mining, it remains that coal is a terrible habit whose unaccounted costs far, far outweigh its value as a "cheap" form of energy.
I encourage everyone that is interested/concerned about the future of energy in this country to check out his website, and if you know Jeff is speaking at a venue near you, do not miss the opportunity to see and hear him in person.
And if anyone really believes that there is such a thing as clean coal, or that carbon dioxide sequestration is a promising technology, let me know... I've got some swamp-land to sell...
Jeff's website: http://jeffrbiggers.com/
Jeff's blog on coal-is-dirty.com: http://www.coal-is-dirty.com/blog/5
