An editorial in today’s Lexington Herald-Leader urges Governor Steve Beshear to consider the homes and health of people in Benham and Lynch before allowing destructive surface mining there.

According to the article, two coal operators and their associates spent more than $500,000 to get Beshear re-elected last fall – the largest private-sector donors to Beshear’s campaign.

One donor, James C. Justice II of A&G Coal, plans to mine near Benham and Lynch, threatening the community’s water supply and quality of life. The Beshear administration has given preliminary approval. From the editorial:

With coal money talking so loudly and directly into his ear, the governor should try extra hard to hear average Kentuckians whose homes, health and future are imperiled by the coal industry’s most destructive practices.

The ridges that cradle Lynch — and are at risk of being destroyed — are part of Black Mountain, Kentucky's highest point, which school children fought to save from strip-mining in the late 1990s.

You can’t put a price tag on the history and possibilities that will be lost if Beshear sacrifices this little corner of Kentucky.

The other donor, James Booth of Cambrian Coal, has a permit to mine in Pike County that a judge attempted to block before Beshear’s Energy and Environment Secretary Len Peters overruled him and allowed the permit to go through.

Cambrian’s plan to chop 400 feet off a mountain near Elkhorn City in Pike County will pollute tributaries of the Russell Fork that were already seriously degraded by earlier mining.

The editorial follows an analysis of campaign contributions in The Courier-Journal by Tom Loftus. To read that article, click here.

To read the full Lexington Herald-Leader editorial, click here.

To learn more about Benham and Lynch residents’ efforts to protect their community, click here.

Melina Laboucan-Massimo stands in solidarity with our mountain communities. Melina’s indigenous Lubicon Cree community has been devastated by tar sands extraction. In both Canada and the United States, she has been a key leader in the fight against the notorious Keystone XL pipeline. Melina will join us at I Love Mountains Day in Frankfort, where she will speak about the impact of fossil fuels on her community and the need to build a new, clean energy economy.

Melina says, “We have seen the destruction of our lands happen right before our eyes. Our water is being contaminated and we are seeing droughts throughout the region. My family used to be able to drink from our watershed, and now within my lifetime we can no longer do so.”

Get a sneak peek at Melina’s story and her inspiring work by reading this interview. You can also hear her powerful voice against damaging fossil fuel extraction, and learn about her vision for a clean energy economy, in this video clip.  And then join KFTC and Melina on Tuesday, February 14th at 12 p.m on the front steps of the Capitol in Frankfort for I Love Mountains Day! Register here.

Despite a growing body of evidence that links coal mining – and particularly mountaintop removal – with lower life expectancy, higher rates of cancer and other life-threatening diseases and increased birth defects, coal companies and their supporters – from Gov. Beshear to local legislators and our Congressional delegation – continue to be silent and even work to suppress this research.

The same thing happens in other coal-impacted communities across the region. Alpha Natural Resources, facing a legal challenge to one of its new mining permits in West Virginia, is trying to keep important health impacts studies out of the courtroom.

The Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition has asked a judge to include West Virginia University studies linking mountaintop removal to birth defects and cancer among residents in its lawsuit challenging the permit for a 235-acre mine proposed by an Alpha subsidiary.

But Alpha lawyers argue the studies should not be considered. From The Charleston Gazette:

Alpha lawyer Bob McLusky argues in a court filing that the environmental groups waited too long to raise the studies, that the health impacts cited have nothing to do with the water pollution permit at issue in the case, and that general health studies shouldn't be used in a case over a specific mining permit.

To read the full story, click here.

Dr. Michael Hendryx, a co-author of the three studies in question, testified before a legislative committee on the health impacts of mining during the 2010 Kentucky General Assembly. To read that story, click here.

To learn more and take action:

• Join KFTC for a webinar on the health impacts of mining at 7 p.m. February 6. For details, click here.
• Come to I Love Mountains Day on February 14 in Frankfort. To register, click here.
• Write letters to the editor of your local or state newspaper and say you care about the impacts of mining on human health. For tips on writing letters, click here.

On Monday and Tuesday of last week, September 26th and 27th, at least 10 KFTC members promoted the need for increased investment in clean energy solutions at the Kentucky Governor's Conference on Energy and the Environment.

After hearing a speaker state that Kentucky doesn't have the resources necessary to generate electricity from renewable energy, member Tona Barkely stood up and asked, "Why do I keep hearing this mantra - that Kentucky doesn't have what we need to generate clean energy? It simply isn't true and I don't know why it continues to be repeated." Several audience members cheered.

Conference participants also had the chance to hear EPA's Region 4 director, Gwendolyn Keyes Fleming, tout the values of clean energy during her speech as well.

"We all recognize the need for clean energy and fuel, green housing, sustainable infrastructures, weaving public health protections into our decisions proactively. And, we have a constitutional rights – our laws don’t say “clean water for some and not for others,” she said.

Taking the conference as a whole, there were signs that the statewide discussion about clean energy solutions is advancing. Compared to the last few years, a comparatively wide variety of sessions on clean energy solutions were offered. Break-out sessions explored distributed energy options in Kentucky, the Kentucky Home Performance home efficiency program and statewide recycling efforts. A representative from East Kentucky Power Cooperative was one of several speakers who promoted the notion that Kentucky has great opportunities for small-scale solar generation and he gave examples of such in the EKPC service territory.

Further, former Governor Bill Ritter of Colorado was invited to speak on a plenary session about the advances his state saw in job creation and renewable energy production during his tenure. He credited the success to the implementation of statewide energy policies that encouraged such growth.

 While dismissive of Kentucky's ability to generate energy from renewable sources, State Energy Secretary Len Peters and Kentucky Chamber of Commerce President Dave Adkisson, both said that energy efficiency contains a lot of promise and seems to be the most likely common ground amongst many interests. "There's a quiet revolution going on in conservation," Adkisson said.

By Jefferson County KFTC member Dan Hofmann

I had such a great response to my recent commentary that I thought it would be worth the time to take an in depth look at the implications of such a massive undertaking. 

Now that we know it’s physically possible for solar photovoltaics (PV) to supply all of the electricity needs in Kentucky by covering only 1/5th of the land already cleared by mountaintop removal (MTR) with solar panels, I think it’s important to ask the following: How quickly could we make the transition from coal to solar? How much would it cost in the short and long term? How would this transition affect coal mining jobs and how many jobs would it create? Can our economy, and our environment for that matter, afford to stick with coal for the long term?

I think the only way to make a transition of this scale possible would be to spread it over many decades. In my previous assessment, I estimated that it would take a 69.1 GW solar array to provide all of the electricity needs in Kentucky today, but if this project is spread out over many years the size of the solar array would need to grow to match the expected increase in electric kWh consumption over time. 

Figure 1 below shows what I believe would be a feasible transition from coal-fired electricity to solar PV over the next 50 years. If we start by adding roughly 1 gigawatt (GW) of solar each year and increase that amount by 7% per year for 40 years, we could achieve a net-zero carbon economy by the year 2050; powered entirely by solar PV. It also shows the expected increase in electricity consumption from a total of about 90 terawatt-hours (TWh) today to about 240 TWh in the year 2060. This increased consumption is based on the U.S. Department of Energy’s data that shows an average annual increase of around 2% in electricity consumption in Kentucky from 1980–2005.


Figure 2 below shows the solar PV capacity that would need to be installed per year and the cumulative in direct current (DC) megawatts. There would be a drop off in year 2050 as we achieved net-zero. But, new panels would still need to be manufactured and installed as the industry standard 25-year warranty would expire on earlier solar panels, thereby providing long-term jobs. However, manufacturers claim that solar PV panels can function well past their expiration date, producing electricity for 40 or even 50 years.



Figure 3 below shows the jobs that would be created over the next 50 years. This projection is based on a University of California report that claimed that in the solar industry "20 manufacturing and 13 installation/maintenance jobs [are created] per installed megawatt." As you can see, the 20,000 coal-mining jobs (represented in red in the graph) in Kentucky would pale in comparison to the potential of solar PV. In fact, more than 30,000 jobs could be created in year one with the installation of 1 GW of solar, already matching coal-mining employment. These would not be temporary jobs either. The maintenance jobs would be needed indefinitely and the manufacturing and installations jobs would be needed as some solar panels are retired and replaced by new panels.



Figure 4 below illustrates the corresponding gradual decrease and eventual elimination of coal-mining jobs in Kentucky.

Starting with my estimate from my last commentary, Figure 5 below shows the decrease in the cost per watt DC of installing solar PV and energy storage over the next 50 years. This is based on the fact that the cost per watt to install solar has historically decreased by about 4% per year over that past decade. Energy storage would not need to be added until solar PV electricity production exceeded around 10% of the total, at which point the volatile nature of solar energy can present issues to a stable grid.



Figure 6 below shows the cost per year in dollars to install solar PV, install energy storage, maintain the massive solar array, and build transmission grid infrastructure to get the electricity to residential, commercial and industrial consumers in Kentucky. I used this estimate of $1.5 million per mile to build the high voltage DC (HVDC) transmission lines and estimated an average of 100 miles per line with a maximum of 2,000 MW for each line.  As you can see, the annual payroll for solar manufacturers, solar installers, and solar maintenance jobs could be close to $13 billion a year by 2060, providing much needed employment income to the commonwealth.

Figure 7 below shows the decrease in the consumer price per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for solar energy over time. This cost includes the cost to install solar, install energy storage (beginning in 2020), maintain the solar array, and building the transmission infrastructure. While this decrease may not look like much at first glance, it’s much more desirable than the dramatic cost increases in Figure 8 if we were to stick with coal. 

Figure 8 below shows the expected increasing cost of coal-fired electricity, which is sharply different from the expected decreasing cost of solar PV electricity over the same time period. This projection is based on a the 5% per year increase in the cost per kWh in Kentucky over the past 10 years for residential, commercial, and industrial sectors in Kentucky from empirical data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.


Figures 9 and 10 below show how costly it could be for Kentucky to ignore to potential of solar energy. While the annual cost of electricity during the transition from coal to solar could be similar to the cost of coal electricity by itself through the year 2030, the exponential increase in coal electricity could drain nearly $150 billion more per year than solar energy by 2060 with a cumulative cost of $1.78 trillion over 50 years. Kentucky has always used the cheap cost of coal electricity to lure business to the commonwealth, the same strategy could be used for solar electricity if we get a head start on competing states.

Figures 11, 12 and 13 show the environmental benefit of using solar PV electricity. It’s clear that solar energy is superior to coal-fired electricity in this department.

Imagine using solar electricity to manufacture solar panels right here in Kentucky!

About the author: Dan Hofmann is President of RegenEn Solar LLC, a solar panel installation company located in Louisville, KY. RegenEn Solar is also a member of the Kentucky Sustainable Energy Alliance with KFTC.

The mountain of coal ash at LG&E's Cane Run Power Plant in Louisville. Photo by Beth Bissmeyer

WFPL-FM, a public radio station in Louisville, aired a three-part series on coal ash this week. Reporter Erica Peterson helped document the health problems that coal ash, escaping from Louisville Gas & Electric's coal-burning power plant and coal ash landfill located in residential neighborhoods, are causing for area residents.

The series can be accessed in whole or individual parts:

Part 1      Part 2      Part 3

The series is available to other public radio stations in Kentucky through the Kentucky Public Radio network. If your local public radio station has not broadcast the coal ash series, please ask them to do so.

Kentucky has the fourth-most toxic air among states, a newly released report found.

Toxic Power: How Power Plants Contaminate Our Air and States found that 77% of the toxins overall and 89% of mercury emissions in Kentucky air come from coal-burning power plants. The analysis was jointly released by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) and based on self-reported data from the polluters.

Exposure to toxic pollution from power plants, including hydrochloric acid, fine particulates, mercury and other metals, is known or believed to contribute to or exacerbate a wide variety of health conditions, the report reminds us, including one or more of the following:

• Asthma and other respiratory ailments,
• Developmental disorders,
• Neurological damage,
• Birth defects,
• Cancer, and
• Premature mortality.

The NRDC / PSR report is consistent with a number of other studies, including one released in March by the American Lung Association that concluded, “Particle pollution from power plants is estimated to kill approximately 13,000 people a year.”

Source: Toxic Power: How Power Plants Contaminate Our Air and States, NRDC, 2011

Former KFTC chairperson Doug Doerrfeld is quoted in a front-page story in today's Lexington Herald Leader about statements made by Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell at a meeting of the Kentucky Coal Association.

"Kentucky has a great opportunity, right now, to transition to a clean-energy economy. Instead, the speech shows how out of touch Mitch McConnell is with his constituents in Kentucky and current science," said Doug Doerrfeld, a recent chairman of the environmental activist group Kentuckians for the Commonwealth. "Kentuckians want clean air to breathe and clean water to drink, and recent EPA action to protect air and water quality is supported by dozens of peer-reviewed scientific studies."

Tom FitzGerald, director of Kentucky Resources Council, added:

"It's fashionable for some in political circles to criticize the EPA, but the agency now is following what Congress wanted done in 1972, when it was created to protect waterways," FitzGerald said.

Posted from: http://wboy.com/story.cfm?func=viewstory&storyid=99156

A new study conducted by the West Virginia University School of Medicine finds poorer health in Appalachian counties where coal is mined, especially those with mountaintop mining operations.
The study, Health-Related Quality of Life Among Central Appalachian Residents in Mountaintop Mining Counties, appears in the May issue of the American Journal of Public Health.

The study relied on a population-based measure of health-related quality of life developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Residents in four central Appalachian states – Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia – contacted randomly by telephone were asked questions about how many poor mental and physical health days they had experienced in the previous 30 days.

Residents of mountaintop mining counties reported, on average, 18 more unhealthy days per year than did the other populations.

Michael Hendryx, associate professor in the Department of Community Medicine and co-author of the study, noted that the study found effects for women as well as for men.

Hendryx published a controversial study in 2009 that found better health and greater economic prosperity in Appalachian counties with no coal mining than in those with coal mining operations. He and a co-author concluded in that study that the costs of illness and premature death outweigh the economic benefits of the coal industry.

A National Mining Association–commissioned an analysis of that 2009 study suggested that it had failed to consider the effects of obesity, diabetes and alcohol consumption; Hendryx countered by calling for an analysis that was not funded by the industry and was, like his study, peer-reviewed.
Regarding the current study, Hendryx said that direct environmental quality data is needed.

“We don’t know exactly how this (mining) affects the air and water,” he said. “That’s one of the big next steps — to collect that data and relate it to human health.”

Michael Hendryx testified before the Kentucky House Health and Welfare Committee about the health impacts of mountaintop removal mining in February 2009. Read about his testimony here.

KFTC members from eastern Kentucky contributed towards building a region-wide research agenda at the "Appalachian Community & Ecosystems Health Summit" last week.

Approximately 100 researchers, scientists and community members, mostly from the Central Appalachian region, gathered at the summit sponsored by the Eastern Kentucky University Environmental Research Institute and Wheeling Jesuit University. 

Participants collaboratively created research and data priorities in several topic areas, including community health impacts of fossil fuel extraction, water, the true cost of coal and creating economies that sustain communities. The negative impacts that coal mining is having on the region's community health and the environment and the resulting lack of economic diversification was a constant focus of group discussion.

During the summit, West Virginia University's Dr. Michael Hendryx said that his studies show that all of the combined problems found in coal mining areas including poverty, pollution, unemployment, stress, etc. result in about 11,000 extra deaths a year.

Relying on the extensive academic and scientific knowledge in the room, the group also began compiling a list of studies already in existence on community and ecosystems health in Central Appalachia.

KFTC participants will continue developing this regional study compilation and identifying research gaps going forward. One member expressed a desire to take this information to Governor Beshear, noting that we don't have to wait until the election to show him the facts about what is happening.

Look for more information about this summit in the upcoming issue of BTS. And, check the blog and BTS in the future to read about existing health studies.