It’s Getting Hot In Here

There is no argument that a coal rush is underway in the United States. The writing is on the wall as energy providers hasten to build new coal fired powerplants before the passage of national legislation that places a price on carbon and hinders the economic viability of coal. Even Virginia’s own Democratic Representative Rick Boucher has stated, “… it’s now virtually certain that within the next three years, Congress will pass a law that will impose mandatory controls on greenhouse gases.” despite his close ties to the coal industry. Strong words for a representative upholding a new coal fired power plant in his very own district in Southwest Virginia.

This past Tuesday, nearly 300 citizens from across the Commonwealth of Virginia turned out in droves to implore judges from the Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC) to deny a permit for the construction of a coal fired power plant in Wise County Virginia. Lawyers who have been working with the SCC for upwards of 30 years have said that they have never seen anything like the public turnout that the Wise County plant is receiving. Just as promising was the remarkable student presence at the January 8^th public hearing. While it’s easy to take a long winter break after the rush of finals, students in the Virginia Climate Action Network, a network of colleges, universities, and high schools, put their priorities in a different order. Together they organized a 60 student climate convergence surrounding the public permit hearing and also held anti-coal actions at the Dominion Virginia Power headquarters.

In the end, students from 10 different VA colleges and universities spoke out against a proposed power plant on Tuesday and did so with incredibly strong, uncompromising statements. Some spoke about the effects of Mountain Top Removal, a destructive strip mining practice used around many Appalachian Communities to extract coal. Others spoke of the plant’s effects on human health, Virginia rate payers, and climate change. While others simply delivered pleads for saving ourselves from a destructive future. Jessie Mowles, a student from Hollins University said “We want you to know that if this permit is granted, we will continue to fight this plant and we will not stop.”

Local Wise County residents in a position to be directly affected by the plant gave some of the most compelling testimony. Stephens resident Gary Selvage remarked that supporters of the proposed plant no longer care about the region’s residents “Why can’t you say that any more pollution from these power plants is too much? The lives of the people in Southwest Virginia are being sold, and for what? The pollution is going to kill us, but I guess we’ll die with more money in our pockets.”

Selvage’s wife Kathy urged the panel to stop this plant in its tracks. “Let’s not make Virginia win the race to the bottom,” she said. “The state of Virginia shouldn’t have this on her conscience. Over 50 percent of coal plants across the country were denied permits last year due to global warming.”

Despite this historic turnout, the fight to stop this 585 MW Waste Coal power plant has just begun. While Al Gore “can’t understand why there aren’t rings of young people blocking bulldozers and preventing them from constructing coal-fired power plants,” students in Virginia are heeding their own call to fight out against the injustice of coal.