Mountaintop Removal Mining
Designed as an alternative to traditional mining, MTR is a cheaper and quicker yet highly destructive form of coal mining practiced in the Appalachian regions of Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. In MTR, coal mining companies literally blast off whole portions of mountains. This exposes the coal located deep within the mountain, allowing it to be extracted more easily. Excess debris from the explosion is dumped into neighboring valleys and streams, sometimes completely burying them. The Sierra Club estimates that as of 2007, over 1,200 miles of streams have been buried or polluted because of MTR practices. After the coal is extracted it is washed and cleaned for shipping. Every year, 90 million gallons of slurry, the excess water and waste left over from washing the coal, is produced because of MTR. Slurry is stored in very unstable impoundments that are susceptible to breaching. Oftentimes, these impoundments are located close to existing ecosystems and human communities, so when breaches occur, they are especially destructive. In short, MTR is one of the most destructive and irresponsible ways to that we obtain energy. Unfortunately, use of MTR as a mining process has steadily increased over the past decade. In 2001, MTR accounted for only 5 percent of the total coal mined, yet in 2006, MTR provided over 30 percent of the coal for some regions in West Virginia.
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