Mountaintop removal offends my core

As many of my readers may know, I grew up in the southern Appalachian Mountains, which had everything to do with my eventually finding a career in environmentalism.  I’ve had a framed “Stop Strip Mining” poster on my wall since long before I had any sort of professional connection to these issues.

The mountains are spiritual to me, and some days I find it hard even to believe that this sort of thing is going on. 

Everybody knows I am all about developing and promoting sustainability solutions; I don’t do environmental rage.  But this abomination begs for it. 

I know my audience expects me to write about cities and their neighborhoods, but maybe this story will reach some urban readers who haven't been exposed to this issue before.  You can learn about it here, and on the blog of my NRDC colleague Melissa Waage.  In the meantime, I can’t tell the story as well as the bluegrass band Magnolia Mountain does in the video below, which I found through an excellent article by Jeff Biggers on EcoWatch.

Related story: Coal miner’s granddaughter (February 24, 2008)

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  Please also visit NRDC’s sustainable communities video channel.