Beverly, Mass. -
“Coal: Plentiful but DEADLY” were the words written on the protest sign.
The little boy holding the sign looked so determined to have us understand how serious this is. Six-year-old Louis had come from Milton with his mom and sister to join protestors in front of the Salem coal-fired power plant. Sunday, March 1, was a cold, snowy Nor’easter storm day in New England, but Louis didn’t seem to mind. It appeared as if Louis felt like he had a job to do — telling us adults that we better pay attention to the damage we were doing.
I came to the protest out of solidarity with the thousands of other people who would be protesting at coal-fired power plants across the United States on March 1 and March 2. The 2,500 people heading to Washington D.C. to protest in front of the Capital Power Plant on March 2 were even willing to be arrested if necessary. I did not think that the issue called for such drastic measures, but did want to show my support so I packed up my family and two friends and we drove over to Salem to join other protestors in front of the plant.
But during the protest, something awakened inside me. Seeing Louis and his 9-year-old sister, Claudia, standing there made me want to stop the damage we are doing to the air, land and water they will inherit. The words of Rev. Jeffrey Barz-Snell resonated within me when he ended his address to the small crowd by saying, “We don’t want our children to ask us in 10 years why we knew of the dangers of coal but didn’t do anything about it.”
As reported by the organizers of
www.capitolclimateaction.com,
www.350.org, and our local group
www.healthlink.org, here are just a few of the many reasons why coal is harmful to our health and our planet:
1. Coal Fuels Global Warming: Coal is the largest single source of global warming pollution in the United States. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has reported that global warming threatens human populations and the world’s ecosystems with intensifying heat waves, floods, drought, and extreme weather and by spreading infectious diseases.
2. Coal-fired power plants emit hazardous pollutants into our air, land, water, and lungs: Materials emitted from coal power plants include: arsenic, beryllium, cadmium, dioxin, lead, formaldehyde, and mercury. Tiny soot particles include harmful sulfates and sulfur dioxide.
3. Coal kills people and causes disease: According to the American Lung Association, pollution from coal-fired power plants causes 23,600 premature deaths, 21,850 hospital admissions, 554,000 asthma attacks, and 38,200 heart attacks every year. The Center for Disease Control estimates that 12,000 coal miners died from black lung disease between 1992 and 2002.
4. Coal contaminates fish: Mercury emitted from the coal plants into our oceans and lakes turns into methylmercury, a potent neurotoxin that can cause severe neurological and developmental damage in humans, especially small children and fetuses. This can happen primarily from eating contaminated fish and shellfish.
5. Coal kills clean jobs: The coal industry is one of the least job-intensive industries in America. Every dollar we invest in coal is a dollar we can’t spend creating jobs in the clean-energy economy. In fact, the country’s wind sector now employs more workers than the coal industry. Investing in wind and solar power would create 2.8 times as many jobs as the same investment in coal.
6. Coal costs billions in taxpayer subsidies: The U.S. government continues to subsidize coal-related projects despite its impact on health, climate and the economy.
7. Coal destroys mountains: Many coal companies now use mountaintop removal to extract coal. Mountaintop removal has leveled more than 450 mountains across Appalachia. Mountaintop removal destroys ecosystems, stripping away topsoil, trees, and destroys habitats, filling streams and valleys with rubble, poisoning water supplies and generating massive impoundments that can cause catastrophic floods.
What you can do to help reduce pollution from coal plants:
1) Call your congressman today. Ask them to support clean energy such as Cape Wind offshore wind farm and to improve emissions standards at existing coal plants. Reach Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., at: Phone, 202-224-4543; fax, 202-224-2417; Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass.: Phone 202-224-2742; fax, 202- 224-8525 and Rep. John Tierney, D-Salem: Phone 978-531-1669, fax, 978-531-1996.
2) Contact your electricity provider and sign up for renewable energy.
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