Bristol Herald Courier reports intimidation calls

The Bristol Herald Courier is reporting that Larry Bush, a leader with Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, one of CCAN’s coalition partners on the fight against the controversial Wise County coal plant, has been receiving threatening phone calls from supporters of the plant.

CCAN would like to send its sympathy out to Larry and his family for being targeted with threats and intimidation by plant supporters. We hope that supporters of the plant will oppose the use of this kind of tactic and engage in democratic debate instead. Read the article after the jump. Continue reading

Yogis heart CCAN!

When you start doing yoga, it just makes you feel good. It feels like you’re body has been worked out, you’re tired, and you feel like you’ve done something good for yourself. It like when you change your first light bulb Continue reading

The Big Lump Gets Thumped

King Coal’s year of rejection by banks, judges, and a whole lotta other folks

The Earth Policy Institute just released this revelatory chronology of really sad, horrible, and depressing events in the life of the coal industry since February 2007. What’s next — will Santa be switching to lumps of dirt?

Additional commentary can be found at http://www.earthpolicy.org/Updates/2008/Update70_timeline.htm

26 February 2007 – James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and a leading climate scientist, calls for a moratorium on the construction of coal-fired power plants that do not sequester carbon, saying that it makes no sense to build these plants when we will have to “bulldoze” them in a few years.

26 February 2007 – Under mounting pressure from environmental groups, TXU Corporation, a Dallas-based energy company, abandons plans for 8 of 11 proposed coal-fired power plants, catalyzing the shift from coal-based to renewable energy development in Texas.

2 April 2007 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide and that EPA’s current rationale for not regulating this gas is inadequate.

3 May 2007 – Washington Governor Christine Gregoire signs a bill that prevents new power plants from exceeding 1,100 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions per megawatt hour of electricity generated, creating a de facto moratorium on building new coal-fired power plants in the state.

30 May 2007 – Progress Energy, an energy company serving approximately 3.1 million customers in the Southeast, announces a two-year moratorium on the construction of new coal-fired power plants.

2 July 2007 – The Florida Public Service Commission denies Florida Power & Light the permits needed to move forward with the massive 1,960-megawatt coal-fired Glades Power Park, citing uncertainty surrounding future carbon costs.

13 July 2007 – Florida Governor Charlie Crist signs an Executive Order establishing “maximum allowable emission levels of greenhouse gases for electric utilities.” Under the emissions cap, building new coal-fired power plants in the state seems unlikely.

18 July 2007 – Citigroup downgrades the stocks of Peabody Energy Corp., Arch Coal Inc., and Foundation Coal Holdings Inc., prominent U.S. coal companies. The decision reflects the growing uncertainty surrounding coal’s future in the United States. Continue reading

Labor supports MD action on global warming

In a statement released yesterday, representatives from Maryland chapters of the SEIU, Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA), and United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), as well as the MD Department of Labor and the Department of Economics at the University of Maryland, came out in support of the Maryland Global Warming Solutions Act. That’s quite an impressive coalition right there – and the timing couldn’t be better, with other unions getting louder and louder in voicing their opposition. Some excerpts from the statement:

America is making a transition to cleaner and more efficient energy use. The real question is will Maryland be part of the solution or simply buy its solutions from somewhere else. The Global Warming Solutions Act (SB 309/HB 712) puts the state on a competitive path through investment in our future. Investments in sectors that deal with energy efficiency and renewable energy are parts of a new and long lasting economy that cannot be outsourced.

In addition, there are incredible opportunities to foster the development of all new “green collar” jobs. These jobs will include installing high-performance appliances and machinery, retrofitting buildings that are leaking energy, building wastewater reclamation, and reusing materials, to name a few.

Maryland stands to create an entirely new arm to its economy and infrastructure. As the transition to clean energy occurs, we want to be part of creating it and profiting from the opportunity. The entire world is looking for solutions that Maryland can play a big role in providing.

When Governor O’Malley testified before the U.S. Senate on global warming, he said, “Economic progress at the cost of environmental sustainability is not progress at all. When given a choice between progress and regression, the people of Maryland always choose progress. Tomorrow can be better than today and each of us has a personal and moral responsibility to make it so.” The Global Warming Solutions Act encompasses that commitment to action, progress and economic development. Maryland deserves no less.

VP of Exxon is a Fossil Fool!

Watch as our very dear billionaires for oil try to present one of their brethren, J. Steven Simon, Director and Senior Vice President of Exxon Mobil, with his Fossil Foolie Award! Unfortunately, Mr. Simon didn’t accept the award, though “the body guards somewhat acknowledged us.”

Washingtonian Calls Kaine "Dirty Rotten Scoundrel"

Being mentioned in the same breath as Cheney, Bush, Inhofe, and Barton is never good, but that is exactly what the Washingtonian did with Governor Tim Kaine as part of their list of the top ten local politicians that are not doing good for the environment. The Washingtonian minced no words, essentially calling the Governor a hypocrite for his support of emissions reductions while still remaining a strong proponent of “dirty energy.” It is Kaine’s steadfast support of Dominion’s controversial Wise County coal plant that got the Governor listed as a “Dirty Rotten Scoundrel.”

Over the last month, the heat on Kaine has really been turned up. He has been dogged at nearly every public appearance and has been the subject of numerous articles relating to Dominion Power’s controversial coal proposal. His public position is that even though we want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and move away from coal, the $1.8 billion investment in new coal generation is a step in the right direction.

Other politicians and governing bodies have questioned the wisdom of building a new coal plant when better technologies exist, including the Metro Washington Council of Governments, Arlington County, the City of Alexandria, Fairfax County, the City of Blacksburg, Albermarle County, the City of Charlottesville, Fairfax Chairman Gerry Connolly, and Former Arlington Chairman Paul Ferguson.
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Dominion rejects coal and starts puppy adoption center!

(Richmond, VA) After being presented with a fossil foolie award, recognizing Thomas Farrell, CEO, for his foolish plans to build a plant in Wise County, Mr. Farrell made a sober decision to swear off coal, and instead switch all their investments into puppy adoptions.

Somewhat resistant at first, Dominion called the police to boot the unassuming citizens, who were merely looking out for the moral fiber of the CEO. But, once he talked to them, and recognized the power of their arguments and their honesty.
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Kaine Confronts Coal in Ashburn

Last night Governor Kaine held the 9th of 10 town hall meetings in Ashburn, Virginia. The meetings have been designed for the Governor to travel around the state to so he can speak highly of himself and the positive legislation that was passed in the General Assembly in 2008. But, as is rapidly becoming the case everywhere he goes, the Governor spent much of his time answering and dodging questions about Dominion’s controversial Wise County coal plant. Mr. Kaine has become very adept at juking the hard questions and deflecting criticism about his continued support of coal, in spite of the fact that it is becoming increasingly clear that a majority of Virginians want a clean energy leader, not another coal company stooge.

‘Protesters’ (e.g. me in a blazer, and Allison from GWIPL) greeted the Governor as he walked in, asking him to “please stop the Wise County Plant.” The governor deftly breezed past me like I was a chocolate eclair and he was on a diet. But, walking the gauntlet into the building was the easy part of Kaine’s night.

After the Governor rambled for thirty minutes about being an “optimist,” the questions about the controversial coal plant started.

Kayti Wingfield asked the Governor to be a ‘leader like Kansas Governor Sebelius’ who has stopped multiple coal plants and seen her national recognition and popularity rise as a result. The Governor respectfully declined.

John Koontz of Leesburg, a clean energy businessman, told the Governor that he frequently had to travel Maryland, Deleware and Pennsylvania to do business and asked the Governor to help make Virginia more hospitable to renewable energy. Once again, the Governor respectfully declined, stating his ‘belief’ that one day we will magically get a large portion of our energy from renewables.

One of the final questions of the night came from a man that asked the Governor, “why do we avoid free and non-polluting sources of energy [like wind and solar], and rush to polluting sources like coal that destroy our air and kill our children?” To which the Governor replied that renewable energy is not reliable enough to meet our needs — children be damned!

So what can we take away from this meeting? Has the Governor wavered in his support of Dominion’s controversial coal plant? No, not really. His talking points tonight were the same as the have been when we called into his radio shows and infiltrated his other Town Hall Meetings. His talking points include:

  • Coal is getting cleaner, and this plant will be very clean [but will not capture carbon and will still spew NOx, SOx and Mercury]

  • I don’t envision a no coal future for Virginia or the Nation, but coal should comprise less of our energy portfolio [and the quickest way to increase renewable energy production and reduce reliance on coal is to build another coal burning plant?]

  • You didn’t say anything when I approved this plant in 2006, my hands are tied [no one said anything about the abusive driver fees when it was passed either…]

  • The SCC and Air Pollution Control Board/DEQ have authority over this permit, I couldn’t do anything even if I wanted to [1. like you have no influence in this state, give me a break! 2. we aren’t asking you to overstep your bounds, we are simply asking you to not publicly support this controversial plant]

So those are his stock responses, and he is really good at taking your question and fitting it into one of those answer. I challenege you, the people of Virginia, to ask him a question that he can’t give you one of those answers to. It a brain puzzler up there with the Rubicks cube.

Send Kaine an email or call him at 804-786 2211

Billionaires for Oil greet oil executives

Today, Director and Senior Vice President of Exxon Mobil J. Steven Simon, President of Shell John Hoffmeister, Vice Chairman of Chevron Peter J. Robertson, Executive Vice President J.E. (John) Lowe, and Chairman and President of BP America Robert A. Malone arrived at the Cannon Office Building to report to the House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming. These men were greeted by “Billionaires for Oil“, a giant piggybank, and students who were asking them to invest in their future, not new gas.

This action was part of a nation-wide student-lead campaign called, “Fossil Fools Day,” a day of activism and non-violent direct action to bring awareness of global warming. Students in Boston chained themselves to a bank, residents in North Carolina stopped construction on a coal plant, and more. Students greeted the executives in front of the Cannon building with boos and signs that said “, for pictures, go here.
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