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Tr-Ash Talk: A House United Against Clean Water
On Friday, in a 267–144 vote, a majority of House members voted to keep allowing coal ash to pollute our drinking water. The passage of the Coal Residuals Reuse and Management Act (H.R. 2273) lets states choose to adopt a disposal standard less protective than those for household garbage. The bill fails to protect communities from…
Read MoreHouse Tees Up Toxic Agenda For America
This week, President Obama has conducted a bus tour through my home state of Virginia and North Carolina. The tour focused on job creation and the state of our economy. Unfortunately, Republican leadership in Congress thinks weakening our clean air and water protections is the foundation of economic renewal. Since returning from August recess, the…
Read MoreCrybabies of the West
Let’s say you have three kids, and one big piece of cake to divide amongst them. One kicks and cries and whines. “I want it ALL,” the baby screams. “I want it all NOW!” The other two say, “We want our fair share.” To keep the decibel level in the house at acceptable levels, and…
Read MoreBeach Retreat
As we say goodbye to sweet, summer days and the beautiful beaches we enjoyed this year, we can look forward with some assurance to more summers on the beaches—but not too many more. The problem is, we may not even have beaches to go to by the end of the century.  A recent study…
Read MoreWe Said Run the Country, Not Ruin It
Somewhere along the road from their home districts to their offices in Washington, D.C., our Congressional representatives got their wires crossed. The American public sent them forth with a mandate to run the country, but instead, they’re ruining it. Toward the end of September, the House passed the first piece of House Majority Leader Eric…
Read MoreLet's Unplug Dirty, Old Coal Plants
Across the nation, old coal-fired power plants are gasping for their last breath, having survived long past their prime because of political favors and weak government regulations. They would have died decades ago if not for a fateful policy compromise in the late 1970s that exempted existing power plants from new air quality standards in…
Read MoreCongress Officially 'Friends' Coal Ash
Earthjustice President Trip Van Noppen is strongly denouncing a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives today, passing H.R. 2273, which would prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from strongly regulating coal ash: “Nearly three years after the tragic spill of more than 1 billion gallons of toxic coal ash in Kingston, Tennessee, it’s obvious that federally enforceable…
Read MoreCoal, Hard Facts
Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper took a feel-good tour of a Colorado coal mine this week, bolstering his corporate-friendly cred in the southern part of the state. He talked about how great it was that the mine could co-exist with wildlife, and joked about the high-paying jobs. And for all of you self-serving Prius owners who…
Read MoreTr-Ash Talk: This is About Health, Not Jobs
The anticipated vote on H.R. 2273, the Coal Residuals Reuse and Management Act, will be upon us Friday. The bill (sponsored by Rep. David McKinley (WV-R)) would prevent the EPA from establishing a strong national rule to protect American’s health and drinking water from the nation’s second largest industrial waste stream: coal ash. There are…
Read MoreRepublicans Like Clean Air, Too
The title of this post isn’t a revelation. If it’s surprising at all, it’s only because there is one highly visible place where it just isn’t true: Congress. The Republican leadership is working hard to make the legislative branch of our government a kind of Bermuda triangle where clean air standards disappear mysteriously down a…
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