www.nrdc.org/policy at 202-289-2361 or at 415-875-6113 contact For more information, Jon Devine Johanna Wald

Land Facts which is caused by inhaling coal dust. most notably black lung disease (pneumoconiosis) injuries and are vulnerable to serious diseases, on the job. Coal miners also suffer many nonfatal 2006 and 2007, a total of 80 miners were killed as hazardous as the average private workplace; in United States. The industry is about five times is one of the most dangerous professions in the Miners’ Health and Safety at Risk: Dangerous Working Conditions Can Put combustion, and leave behind a trail of waste. coal mining and transportation, continue with environment. Environmental insults begin with air, and can severely harm human health and the contributes to damage to the land, water, and The way coal is currently produced and used Health and the Environment Coal Mining Can Harm People’s without thenegative impactsofcoal. efficiency and renewable demands resources canhelpusmeet ourenergy warming. Fortunately, there are solutionsavailable right now: Energy fouling ourairandwater, harming ourland,andcontributing toglobal threatening activitiesonearth, among themostdestructive ourhealth, Theconventional coalfuelcycle is extraction anduseare significant. cheap. But appearancesare costsofconventional coal deceiving:thetrue Compared tothesoaring price ofoilandnaturalgas,coalmightseem environment impacts on human health and the Coal mining can have disastrous “Clean Coal” There Is No Such Thing as Coal mining

of streams from 1985 to 2001. More broadly, valley fills alone buried more than 700 miles streams. The government has estimated that that removal (MTR) mining in the headwaters of mining waste often associated with mountaintop on water occurs from valley fills, the depositing of recreational use. The most dramatic physical effect can make the water undrinkable and unfit for be carried into streams and groundwater, and AMD. AMD causes heavy metals and toxins to of chemical pollution is acid mine drainage, or sediments and chemicals. The most serious kind surface mining can pollute nearby waters with agricultural purposes. Both underground and supply household drinking water and water for can damage the underground aquifers that Strip mining, particularly in the semi-arid West, Mining Can Make Our Water Undrinkable:

© Photo by Vivian Stockman / www.ohvec.org. Flyover courtesy SouthWings. There Is No Such China’s Appetite for Coal Thing as “Clean Coal” Together, China and the U.S. are responsible for half of world coal production, with China alone producing more than 2.3 billion tons in 2006. China’s total power generation capacity topped 600 billion watts (GW) in 2006. Given the country’s skyrocketing economic growth, this figure is expected between 1992 and 2002, surface coal mining to reach more than 800 GW by 2010, making China in Appalachia has damaged or destroyed more the fastest-growing power sector in the world. than 1,200 miles of streams and deforested some China’s coal sector is not only the world’s largest, Land Facts Land 380,000 acres, with valley fills covering more but also the most dangerous and most polluting. than 83,000 acres and affecting the drainage of Pulmonary disease, closely related to air pollution some 438,000 acres of watershed.1 If current from coal burning, is the second-largest single cause policies do not change, these numbers will increase of adult deaths in China (13.9 percent of the total). dramatically over the coming decade. China’s carbon dioxide emissions accounted for more than 18 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions in Mining Adds Harmful Pollution to Our Air: 2004.China’s rapid economic growth and increasing There are two main sources of air pollution during reliance on coal puts it on course to overtake the the coal production process: methane emissions United States as the world’s leading carbon emitter from the mines, which contribute to global by 2010. warming pollution, and particulate matter (PM) emissions, which can cause significant respiratory Unsafe Storage of Process Wastes Threatens damage as well as premature death. Communities: Coal mining generates large quantities of waste. One significant form of Abusive Mining Techniques Scar the Land and waste is the sludge that is produced from washing What Else Comes From Coal? Can Damage Wildlife Habitats: Coal mining— coal. In some locations, sludge is collected in Like the coal production process, and particularly surface or strip mining—poses impoundments, which can pose a threat to human burning coal is associated with a significant threat to terrestrial habitats in the life and the environment if they fail. numerous environmental harms. United States. Clearcuts associated with surface mining activity can fragment habitat, destroying n 10.3 million tons of sulfur natural areas. The Appalachian region produces What Is the Future for Coal? dioxide were released from U.S. more than 30 percent of our nation’s coal, and Reducing the harms from coal requires a power plants in 2004, 95 percent mining there commonly wipes out forested multipronged approach. NRDC’s first priority is of these emissions coming from areas. This region is one of the most bio-diverse to minimize dependence on coal and other fossil coal-fired plants. temperate regions in the world, and is home to fuels through conservation, more efficient use of n Nitrogen oxide emissions from hundreds of unique species of plants, invertebrates, energy, and greater development of renewable power plants in the United States salamanders, mussels, and fish. And in the arid energy resources. These resources have the totaled about 3.9 million tons in West, surface mining activities can cause severe technical capability to eliminate the need for new 2004, with more than 90 percent environmental damage as huge machines strip, coal-fired power plants and to help significantly of these emissions coming from rip apart, and scrape aside vegetation, soils, and reduce our overall reliance on coal. Nonetheless, coal-fired units. wildlife habitat and as they drastically—and some 120 coal-fired power plants are currently n An estimated 48 tons of permanently— reshape existing land forms and on the drawing board, and many hundreds more mercury, 56 tons of arsenic, 62 the affected area’s ecology to reach the subsurface are already in operation. Thus, every effort also tons of lead compounds, 62 tons coal. Reclamation of mined land is problematic: must be made to minimize the environmental of chromium compounds, 23,000 although more than 31,000 acres have been harm from coal production, processing, and tons of hydrogen fluoride, and strip-mined in Montana, reclamation has been transportation and to require that power 134,000 tons of hydrochloric acid completed on only 216 of them. companies use the best available technology for are emitted each year by U.S. coal conversion to dramatically reduce emissions of coal-burning plants. Transporting Coal Pollutes Our Air: Moving particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, coal from where it is mined to where it will be mercury and other hazardous air pollutants, and burned produces significant quantities of air carbon dioxide from coal use. pollution and other environmental harms. With the toll from coal so steep, America’s Diesel-burning trucks, trains, and barges that highest priorities must be to reduce its reliance transport coal spew dangerous chemicals into the on coal and to accelerate the transition to an earth’s atmosphere. The serious health risks from energy future that maximizes energy efficiency and these toxic emissions include chronic bronchitis, renewable resources. heart attacks, and decreased lung function, while carbon from diesel combustion contributes to 1 U.S. EPA, Mountaintop Mining/Valley Fill DEIS, (2003), p. III A-1 and IV C-1, global warming. www.epa.gov. www.nrdc.org/policy © Natural Resources Defense Council March 2008 R2 Printed on recycled paper