Carbon Capture, Drugs in Drinking Water, Feeding Senior Citizens and More

Carbon Capture Technology could be the key to using coal cleanly.

What impact do drugs in drinking water have?

A national organization tackles senior hunger in McDowell County, West Virginia.

And we revisit a famous West Virginia civil rights case.

Carbon Capture Technology Update. Burning coal is the biggest source of CO2 on the planet. But coal is also a huge source of electric power, and its big business here in West Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania. The Allegheny Front’s Reid Frazier found that carbon capture technology could hold the key to solving this riddle–but it still has several hurdles to overcome.

Your Drinking Water Could Have a Drug Problem. The water coming out of your faucet at home might contain some drugs prescribed to people you’ve never met. Scientists have known this for a long time, but the research shows no one is getting a full dose of- say, Prozac, just from drinking tap water.  Still, as StateImpact Pennsylvania’s Katie Colaneri reports, scientists do wonder whether drugs in the water may be having more subtle, long-term impacts on human health and aquatic life.

Trout Attend Class. Among the creatures that can be impacted by those drugs that get into the water supply is trout. A program called Trout in the Classroom run by Trout Unlimited helps students understand the importance of keeping waterways as free of drugs and other pollution as possible. The program has hundreds of teachers and students in several states raising trout from eggs, and then releasing them into waterways.  The Allegheny Front’s Kara Holsopple reports on  one class near Pittsburgh has big hopes for its little fish.

At the Front Lines of the Battle Against the Wooly Adelgid. For the past several decades Hemlock trees across the east coast have become home to an invasive insect that is leaving their host-trees dead in the ground. Efforts to manage the blight continue. West Virginia Public Radio’s Glynis Board met up with some on the front of that fight deep in a Preston County, West Virginia, forest and brings us this report.

A Fresh Look At Appalachia in Photos. Ever since the War on Poverty 50 Years ago, pictures of Appalachia that land in the national spotlight often focus on rural poverty stricken hollows and hills. Concord University art student Sterling Snyder wanted to capture the different, and often overlooked urban places in the state. West Virginia Public Radio’s Jared Kline reports.

Early Civil Rights Battle. This week Traveling 219’s Dan Schultz brings us a little known story from Tucker County, where one of West Virginia’s most prominent civil rights cases occurred, long before the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s.

Feeducation: Helping Seniors Eat Better. Much attention has been paid over the years to child hunger, but hunger and poor nutrition are also problems among the country’s senior population. The National Foundation to End Senior Hunger is hoping to change that and has created a pilot program in West Virginia’s poorest county that the organization hopes will be replicated across Appalachia and the country. West Virginia Public Radio’s Cecelia Mason has the story.