ilovemountains - End Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining

Ask your representative to co-sponsor the Clean Water Protection Act

For 25 years, the Clean Water Act (CWA) allowed for the granting of permits to place "fill material" into waters of the United States, provided that the primary purpose of the "filling" was not for waste disposal. As such, the CWA prohibited mountaintop removal operations from using the nation's waterways as waste disposal sites. That changed in 2002, when the Army Corps of Engineers, under the direction of the Bush administration and without congressional approval, altered its longstanding definition of "fill material" to include mining waste. This change accelerated the devastating practice of mountaintop removal coal mining and the destruction of more than 2,000 miles of Appalachian streams.

How You Can Help

Write your representative today and ask him/her to be a co-sponsor of the Clean Water Protection Act, to be introduced by Congressman Frank Pallone of New Jersey and Congressman Dave Reichert of Washington in the 111th Congress. (Click here for a list of co-sponsors from the 110th Congress.)

Points to make in your letter include:

The Clean Water Act is meant to protect, not bury, our rivers and streams.
More than 400,000 acres in West Virginia alone have been leveled, and estimates are that a total of 1.4 million acres of Appalachia's mountains have been destroyed by mountaintop removal mining.
Across the Appalachian coalfields, more than 2,000 miles of streams are now buried and destroyed by mountaintop removal.
The Clean Water Protection Act is necessary to protect clean drinking water for many of our nation's cities.
The Clean Water Protection Act is also necessary to protect the quality of life and economic security for Appalachian coalfield residents who face frequent catastrophic flooding and pollution or loss of drinking water as a result of mountaintop removal.

November 21, 2009

Subject:

I am writing to ask you to become a co-sponsor of the Clean Water Protection Act. This bill is critical for protecting the nation’s waters from being polluted and buried by waste created during mountaintop removal coal mining. Mountaintop removal mining involves clear-cutting native hardwood forests, blowing up entire mountaintops, and dumping millions of tons of debris into nearby streams in order to get at coal seams that lie deep beneath the surface. Already, more than 2,000 miles of Appalachian streams have been destroyed by mountaintop removal mining operations.

For 25 years, the Clean Water Act (CWA) allowed for the granting of permits to place “fill material” into waters of the United States, provided that the primary purpose of the “filling” was not for waste disposal. As such, the CWA prohibited mountaintop removal operations from using the nation’s waterways as waste disposal sites. That changed in 2002, when the Army Corps of Engineers, under the direction of the Bush administration and without congressional approval, altered its longstanding definition of “fill material” to include mining waste. This change accelerated the devastating practice of mountaintop removal coal mining and the destruction of more than 2,000 miles of Appalachian streams.

To stop this devastation of the nation’s waterways, Representatives Frank Pallone and Dave Reichert will introduce the Clean Water Protection Act—a simple piece of legislation that restores the original intent of the Clean Water Act to clarify that fill material cannot be comprised of mining waste.

Passing this legislation would protect all the nation’s rivers, streams, and lakes from being used as garbage dumps for mining waste. It would also help end the destruction of the Appalachian Mountains, home to our nation’s most diverse forests and streams, the headwaters of the drinking water supply of many eastern cities, and a unique and valuable American culture that has endured for generations.

Please join scores of other representatives who have sponsored the Clean Water Protection Act. Thank you for your attention to this important issue.

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