Earth Equity News

Coal Miners Organizing Tennessee Boycott Because of Sen. Alexander's Opposition to Mountaintop Removal. By Kari Lydersen, WashPost, July 26, 2009. "The lush, rolling contours of the Great Smoky Mountains are Tennessee's pride and joy, and a major source of tourism revenue. But Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) says he is afraid of seeing those mountains transformed by the region's coal industry -- their tops blasted off for mining, rivers clogged with debris and majestic forests cloaked in smog from coal-burning power plants instead of the Smokies' famous mists. Alexander has introduced legislation with Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin (D-Md.) to ban the controversial practice of mountaintop-removal coal mining. He said he hopes to stop the shearing of mountaintops in West Virginia and Kentucky and prevent a resurgence of the practice in Tennessee, which has relatively little mining but was the site of mountaintop removal in decades past. But miners in neighboring states are striking back, boycotting tourism in Tennessee in an attempt to punish a politician they say is threatening their jobs while his state relies on coal from elsewhere for the majority of its electric power. Tennessee produced 2.3 million tons of coal last year, compared with 158 million tons in West Virginia and 120 million tons in Kentucky."