Here is an interesting short article in Science on the impact of mountaintop mining. This may have a significant impact on coal mining policy in the eastern US.
Abstract
There has been a global, 30-year increase in surface mining (1), which is now the dominant driver of land-use change in the central Appalachian ecoregion of the United States (2). One major form of such mining, mountaintop mining with valley fills (MTM/VF) (3), is widespread throughout eastern Kentucky, West Virginia (WV), and southwestern Virginia. Upper elevation forests are cleared and stripped of topsoil, and explosives are used to break up rocks to access buried coal (fig. S1). Excess rock (mine “spoil”) is pushed into adjacent valleys, where it buries existing streams.
Link:
One reply on “Mountaintop Coal Mining”
Here is a link to the short movie “Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy
of Mountaintop Removal Mining”, developed by Yale University’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. It provides some perspectives from both the community and corporate sides.
http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2198