after many years, another coal mine opens, the first under Trump

originally posted by: Logarock
a reply to: Aazadan


Your a goddam dumbass. Half of California is full of folks from the coal fields, for the whatever the hell you said it was. And take your geographical bigotry into your ass friend. Those are rugged folks down there that know the old ways provide more with a job than to much of the new way.

It's not bigotry, it's true. Appalachia is the least educated geographical region in the US, at all levels of education. High School, pre HS, post HS, college educated, and so on. They're also in the bottom 5 in literacy.

Yes, they're rugged but being rugged isn't how you produce. All being rugged gets you is a short and uncomfortable life of poverty. A single operator of a machine in Wyoming produces more coal in a day than an entire town of miners in West Virginia. The difference is that the people in WV are either drunk on moonshine or high on opiates and consequently aren't capable of operating heavy machinery.

As far as the old ways go, want to know what else is the old ways? Buggy Whip manufacturers.

Appalachia is a poverty stricken hellhole bordering on third world country status because of drugs and no education. Even when coal was big, it was only a fraction of the economy. All the other jobs left too... because the residents became incapable of holding them.

originally posted by: Logarock
a reply to: Aazadan


What was 9 and 10? Like to see you talk that way about others and get away with it. And really what does anything down there have to do with coal as you are projecting. They just want to mine coal cause they are dumbasses?

No. They want to mine coal because they have cultural ties to it. People in this area tend to be bound to the land and following their parents/grandparents traditions. Those people mined coal, therefore they want to mine coal. It provides money, and it doesn't require education, which none of them have (not to say they're incapable, but schools here don't teach at a high enough level). People see it as a quick and easy solution to a problem.

This ties into #10 on my list. But I was thinking more broadly than coal.

They simply don't value education, that's why universities in the area are lucky to break 30% graduation rates, and why any program that's slightly difficult will typically be under 15%.

#9 has to do with the fact that rural lifestyles require a lot of upkeep. You have to do 100 different jobs on your household just to keep it from falling into ruin. That takes time. Time which could have otherwise been used to study or to practice worthwhile skills. This waste of time directly impacts rural communities. They may be good at repairing their house, or keeping their barn standing, but those aren't high value jobs. It's not Petreoleum Engineering, or building machines that can mine a billion dollars worth of coal a month, or designing new trains that can transport their mined coal at a fraction of the cost and a faster speed. Rural lifestyles are for people who have been consumed by their own stuff to the point that they give up the ability to change themselves for the better.

a reply to: Aazadan

No life can survive in an environment free of any impurities. In fact, impurities make life stronger. Fish can only survive in water that contains impurities. The same is true of all life. People like Arnold Schwarzeneger and Barack Obama try to get rid of every single microbe. That is the wrong approach. If there is no impurities, humans would die out.

a reply to: Logarock

American coal power plants use supercritical boilers. There is hardly any impurities of American coal in the first place. It's nothing like China or India coal.

originally posted by: allsee4eye
a reply to: Aazadan

No life can survive in an environment free of any impurities. In fact, impurities make life stronger. Fish can only survive in water that contains impurities. The same is true of all life. People like Arnold Schwarzeneger and Barack Obama try to get rid of every single microbe. That is the wrong approach. If there is no impurities, humans would die out.

This is such a ridiculous argument. There's also a difference between some waste, which all energy produces and actual clean energy which no one knows how to produce.

I'm not even arguing that anyways. The death print of various energy sources alone tells the tale
www.forbes.com...

Use coal while we work on thorium.

a reply to: starwarsisreal

What do you propose then?

Less than 15% of power plants in China are burning low sulphur coal or have desulpherization equipment.
en.wikipedia.org...

More than two thirds of the Demonstrated Reserve Base of Coal in the United States is low to medium sulphur content.
large.stanford.edu...

Wouldn't it make more sense to ship our low sulphur coal surplus to China?

originally posted by: allsee4eye
a reply to: Aazadan

No life can survive in an environment free of any impurities. In fact, impurities make life stronger. Fish can only survive in water that contains impurities. The same is true of all life. People like Arnold Schwarzeneger and Barack Obama try to get rid of every single microbe. That is the wrong approach. If there is no impurities, humans would die out.

like I said earlier industrial impurities like pesticides, mercury, or pcb's in the water supply are not the same thing as micro organisms such as bacteria and viruses that our immune system can given time adapt too.

It sounds as if you are advocating industrial pollution in order to make life stronger.
I would love to hear your hypothesis behind pollution making life stronger.


Are you saying we should dump more oil in the ocean to make fish stronger?

Are people in flint going to get stronger if they keep drinking the water there?

Why aren't All the people that live near epa super fund sites turning into super humans now instead of dying from
cancer?

So Trumps new plan is to kill off some of his voters?

Health risks associated with Coal mining

There are a great many risks to your health which can be linked to coal mining operations. Though there are obvious workplace hazards associated with working in a coal mine, these are not the only risks associated with mining activities. Simply living within proximity of a mine can actually cause a variety of health concerns, and both types of mining (deep and surface) pose their own set of problems.

Harvard College Global Health Review

Engulfed in a Toxic Cloud: The Effects of Coal Mining On Human Health

The continued growth of coal mining has left communities with pervasive and irreparable damage.

Also why bring back a dead industry?

The Decline Of The Coal Industry Is “Long-Term” And “Irreversible”

In its latest report, Goldman downgraded cut its demand forecast for thermal coal – in September it predicted that by 2019, the world would be burning 2 percent less coal than it did in 2013. Now, it says thermal coal demand will drop by 7 percent.

This is horrific news for coal mining companies. It also ensures that the list of coal companies that have declared bankruptcy – at least several dozen in the last four years – will continue to grow.

‘Coal is in decline’ and it looks like not even Donald Trump can pull the industry’s long-term future out of the fire

The problem for thermal coal miners is that their domestic market is disappearing. For years, coal-fired power accounted for 50 per cent of the total electricity output in the U.S., but it has since fallen to 30 per cent.

it’s unlikely new coal plants will be able to compete with gas unless capital costs sharply decline.

So the only thing this admin has done so far is to step back in time and make people believe the coal mining industry is still a booming business.

I live in a mountain state bordering WV.

I love hiking, mountains and the outdoors.

I have got to say that the modern mining practice of mountaintop removal is one of the most insidious forms of mining that permanently scars the land and makes it look like an apocalyptic wasteland.

a reply to: SolAquarius
I live in West Virginia and if the mine is reclaimed properly the West Virginia beauty is still there and still just as beautiful.

Dad took this picture of my brother running his equipment

And this was taking while pulling in to work one morning


If reclaimed, given time the scars heal.

a reply to: Martin75

I will admit I have not seen the before and after of strip mining myself but I would be pretty pissed if mountains started getting carved up in my area and then told that they would be returned to their natural state.

But like I said I have no direct first hand experience of it so my perception is a bit biased.

You seem to live in area that this is practiced so you have a better understanding of the impact.

a reply to: Martin75

Also a side question many vehicles like the dump trucks and other heavy machinery would seem like they could be automated with a bot in the next few years leaving the operator's out of jobs.

Do you see this happening with the coal companies in the area?

Is there an interest in automation of the coal industry just like automation seems to be taking over other industries?

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: SinDefiant
I'm glad they're opening up coal again. hopefully the people of West Virginia will be able to feed themselves again.

They won't. I live in West Virginia, and I've lived in the area (border towns) for 15 years. I've seen it up close. I'm being perfectly honest here, there are some deep and systemic issues in this area of the country. Coal jobs don't even crack the top 10.

In rough order:
#1. Heroin addiction.
#2. Opiate epidemic.
#3. Pill mills.
#4. Clean water
#5. Literacy.
#6. Transportation infrastructure.
#7. Bad schools.
#8. Generational poverty.
#9. Rural lifestyles.
#10. Backwards culture.

Coal might make #11, but I suspect it's closer to 14 or 15 on the list. Ultimately coal mining is just a job, and the way they do it in West Virginia isn't the way competitive mines do it. The entire population needs retrained, but that's never going to happen when a massive chunk of the work force can't pass a drug test. I've spoken to a few local business owners. At Krogers, 75% of applicants fail. At the company I'm interning at it's 85%. Getting contracted to do construction for the city it's 40%. This all feeds back to issues #1, #2, and #3 on the list. Until the work force gets off drugs, abandons their alcohol abuse (another problem, albeit a legal one), and start living clean and sober lives... they're simply not going to be fit to work in a mine or anywhere else.

I've heard they have a terrible opiate crisis ongoing. I did not know about other problems besides transportation is a given. I come from a small rural town. I believe our census was 5k people. Anyway we mostly build cell phone towers and steel buildings like high school gyms some churches shops and even some houses. it just seems like they would be able to find work be it construction, carpentry, plumbing, electrician. those types of jobs are needed everywhere and require atleast on the job training. I guess what I'm asking is why is it so poor there? it's like a 3rd world country some of the pictures I've seen are horrible. they look like something that you'd see coming out of Africa or India but these are white faced citizens of the usa. I can't believe we would let this happen. Flint Michigan is bad but atleast the government is bringing them water it seems like no one wants to look at WV.

sorry if this is a wall of text I'm on my cell

a reply to: SinDefiant

The county I live in is #2 in the nation per capita for Hep C the #1 county is in WV also. Look up the documentary Oxyana, it's about Oceana a little town about an hour from here. MTV wouldn't go without security....one of our fine no go zones. Lol

a reply to: SolAquarius

They should be but good luck finding anyone willing to spend money on coal. On a side note we have a user here making amazing progress with drones underground for miners safety.

a reply to: Martin75

I have mixed emotions about coal.

West virginia coal keeps the light on where I live but I don't like the long term environmental impact.

I see it is a necessary evil for now coal keeps the power going and we should keep using it for now but also be working towards long term solutions for energy consumption like wind solar wave and better energy storage means. I would also like to see thorium reactors take off as an energy option.

I have no idea how long it will take to crack fusion but hopefully someone figures that out within my lifetime.

originally posted by: SinDefiant
I've heard they have a terrible opiate crisis ongoing. I did not know about other problems besides transportation is a given.

Honestly, maybe the opiate crisis should be #1. It's bad, and I mean really bad. Despite very high unemployment rates (in the town I live in, we have an 8% rate) and practically every single business in town hiring for entry level jobs like cashiers, shelf stockers, and waiters there's no one to fill them because so few residents are actually able to pass a drug test.

I'm working for a factory for my summer internship writing software. The factory workers start at $12/hour which is great for an area where the median wage is $16k/year. Only 1 in 5 applicants makes it through the pre employment drug screen and 1 in 10 makes it through 120 days due to random drug checks (well, semi random... they hit new people more often). That's why most factory workers are in their 50's here. No young workers are coming in to replace them because less than 1 in 50 is actually clean.

There's other rural culture problems too. For example, in both my summer town and my school year town Walmart has shut down almost everyone else. There's restaurants, grocery stores, and Walmart. I've spoken with city council members off the record in both towns, and what they say is that there's nothing they can do. At this point Walmart employs approximately 1/3 the town, so any attempt to open up new business, or bring in competitors results in the threat that they'll close shop and leave the residents with no shops, and 1/3 of people unemployed.

Coal jobs or not, that fundamental problem remains because coal directly employs so few people. Mining towns are basically screwed.

Anyway we mostly build cell phone towers and steel buildings like high school gyms some churches shops and even some houses. it just seems like they would be able to find work be it construction, carpentry, plumbing, electrician. those types of jobs are needed everywhere and require atleast on the job training.

No one has the money for that. It's a poor area. Businesses can't expand because of the threat of Walmart, few can even open up unless they're not a competitor to a store that sells everything. Construction isn't a good paying gig. This area doesn't really have illegals performing construction, but no one has the money for it. At a median income of $16k/year (in the other town I live in, it's $13k) that means people can only afford a house payment of $283. You can't buy a house on that, therefore there's no construction to build homes.

Flint Michigan is bad but atleast the government is bringing them water it seems like no one wants to look at WV.

The water in some of these places is nearly as bad. Due to a chemical spill from fracking, the groundwater just one town over from me is considered toxic.

www.newsandsentinel.com...

It's a chemical called c8. Basically, the residents just brush it off. 2/3 of them think it's a liberal conspiracy to put them out of business and ignore it. The other 1/3 is concerned that the water is toxic and needs special filters. As I said, there's cultural issues at work here too... rugged people who don't accept the premise that something they can't see can kill them. Whether that's particles from burning coal or chemicals in the water. But this issue is almost as bad as Flint.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: SinDefiant
I've heard they have a terrible opiate crisis ongoing. I did not know about other problems besides transportation is a given.

Honestly, maybe the opiate crisis should be #1. It's bad, and I mean really bad. Despite very high unemployment rates (in the town I live in, we have an 8% rate) and practically every single business in town hiring for entry level jobs like cashiers, shelf stockers, and waiters there's no one to fill them because so few residents are actually able to pass a drug test.
.

It seems that we can thank big pharma for the opiate crisis. These guys seem like the real cartels and the doctors are their dealers.

In 1996 Purdue Pharma introduced a new drug – a time-released formulation of oxycodone, an opioid painkiller. OyxContin, as the drug was called, was touted as having a low risk of addiction. Purdue backed OxyContin with an aggressive marketing campaign. Key components of this effort were pain-management and speaker-training conferences in sunshine states such as California and Florida, attended by more than 5,000 physicians, nurses and pharmacists, many of whom were recruited to serve on Purdue’s speakers' bureau. The company also used a bonus system to incentivize its pharmaceutical representatives to increase OxyContin sales. The average bonus exceeded the representatives’ annual salaries.

Purdue Oxycontin

a reply to: SolAquarius

That's part of it, but not all of it. Besides those who make the drugs, the doctors who prescribe them are equally guilty.

It's happening slowly, but where I live we've finally started to see a little bit of justice.

www.cincinnati.com...