Take me home, country roads

	The Episcopal Public Policy Network Policy Alert
[Episcopal News Service] The Episcopal Public Policy Network (EPPN) has issued an appeal for church members to call on President Barack Obama to end the Coal River Mountain mining project. "Mountain top removal mining and valley fill practices cause significant social and environmental impacts, often devastating ecosystems and destroying human communities through water pollution and flooding," a Nov. 10 EPPN alert said. "We have confirmed that blasting has begun on Coal River Mountain, West Virginia, the highest peak ever slated for mountaintop removal mining, and the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) confirmed that coal was being moved off the mountain.” The EPPN alert, which is emailed to about 25,000 Episcopalians and religious advocates, says the news has been "devastating" to local residents "who have rallied around a plan to build a wind farm on the peaks of Coal River Mountain." The proposed wind farm would provide enough wind potential to generate electricity for more than 85,000 homes, as well as clean, permanent jobs to the community. "Local residents have witnessed workers throughout this past week moving heavy equipment up to the mining zones, and blasting and plumes of smoke were seen and heard near the Brushy Fork coal slurry impoundment," the alert said. "The Brushy Fork impoundment is an enormous retention pond holding 8.2 billion gallons of toxic coal slurry waste. If the impoundment were to fail due to the blasting, hundreds of lives will be lost and thousands more will be in jeopardy from an enormous slurry flood." Through the EPPN website, individuals can send a letter to Obama urging an end to the Coal River Mountain mining project. The Episcopal Church's 73rd General Convention in 2000 passed Resolution D005 in opposition of "environmental racism," and called on the Office of Government Relations in Washington, D.C., to "track legislation seeking to eliminate the practice of locating polluting industries disproportionately near neighborhoods inhabited by people of color or the poor." The resolution also called on the Washington office to "monitor and issue policy alerts regarding the practice of mountain top removal and valley fill mining and other large scale mining operations that threaten the ecology and low income communities." "As people of faith, we believe that every creature is precious to God, but we have seen repeated disregard for citizens and the environment through mountaintop removal mining practices," the alert says. "As part of our call to be stewards of creation, we have a duty to use the land responsibly, to manage it so that it serves the good of all, and to protect it for future generations and for all life." » Respond to this article