Mountaintop removal mining is the most destructive way of extracting coal — instead of using mining shafts to reach coal underground, the top of a mountain is blown off.
Mountaintop mining has serious environmental impacts - when mining companies destroy mountains by blowing their peaks off, tons of soot and pollutants rain down on the surrounding area.
However, the government is currently not allowing the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) to protect the environment from the pollution caused from mountaintop mining – and the cost is completely unacceptable.
For example, local streams and rivers turn orange with sulphur as they are buried under mining material. There is a particular problem with burial of headwater streams by valley fills which causes permanent loss of ecosystems that play critical roles in ecological processes.
Furthermore, extensive tracts of deciduous forests that support various endangered and threatened species and represent some of the highest biodiversity in North America are often destroyed.
Moreover, people living in towns near the blast sites are getting lung cancer from the fall out.
The government of any democracy is responsible to protect the people that elect it. Therefore, the government must act and allow the EPA to regulate the environmental impacts of mountaintop mining.
Please sign and share the petition to demand the government acts now to allow the EPA to regulate the environmental impact of mountaintop removal mining.
