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UMWA March Commemorates the Battle of Blair Mountain

It’s been nearly a century since thousands of pro-union miners marched into Logan County, West Virginia, to protest abuses by coal operators in what used to be largely anti-union territory.

Marchers were met at Blair Mountain in Logan County by an army of men, fighting on behalf of anti-union mine guards and local law enforcement. The battle was so heated that then-president Warren Harding called in Army troops to restore order.

This Labor Day, present-day members of the United Mine Workers of America marched from Marmet in Kanawha County to Racine in Boone County, to commemorate what they say was one of the greatest events in the nation’s labor history.

UMWA International President Cecil Roberts speaks to attendees of the 2019 UMWA Labor Day Picnic.

“This is the greatest insurrection in the history of these United States of America, other than the Civil War,” UMWA International President Cecil Roberts said. “We should be teaching this in every classroom in America.”

Unlike the reception union miners received nearly a hundred years ago at Blair Mountain, Monday’s march ended with a celebratory picnic at John Slack Park. Folk music played and veterans and union members alike removed their caps for the national anthem.

But Monday’s picnic wasn’t all about history. Roberts had much to say about the state of the country’s coal industry today, and his group’s concerns with mining jobs leaving the country.

“We don’t make anything here. We import things from China and every third-world country in the world,” Roberts said. “I say, make what we need in America. Protect coal mining jobs.”

Much of Roberts’ speech related to the upcoming 2020 election. He said elected officials should be held accountable for promises they’ve made regarding development of “clean coal” technology, which would reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal.

“We have to develop the technology that we need to burn coal cleanly in America,” Roberts said.

But despite substantial federal investment, technology has not been adopted by the electric utility industry, which has instead opted for cheaper, cleaner natural gas and other alternative fuels.

Roberts also spoke against the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, a law restricting some labor activity.

“It needs to be abolished,” Roberts said. “When I hear one of these candidates say they are for that, then I will know that they really support organized labor.”

Roberts will speak Wednesday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Topics include legislation on climate change, and the “Green New Deal” proposal adopted by several Democratic presidential candidates, which envisions a large-scale transition from fossil fuels.

Emily Allen is a Report for America Corps member.

New Report Examines Morgantown's Greenhouse Gas Emissions

There are a lot of things that contribute to carbon dioxide emissions that drift into the air. For the first time an inventory of how much greenhouse gas is entering the air in Morgantown has been compiled. The environmental consulting firm Downstream Strategies hopes this particular study will inspire other communities to want to do the same.

On a Sunny afternoon, traffic is bustling through one of the busiest intersections in Morgantown on University Avenue. There are cars, buses, and even industrial trucks rumbling through this congested intersection everyday. These vehicles are all playing some role in emitting carbon dioxide into the air, and a new report from Downstream Strategies tries to track down all of the statistics from the year 2012, to see the breadth of Morgantown’s greenhouse gas footprint.

According to the report, activity-based emissions, from vehicle use, solid waste disposal and other factors, contributed to more than 800,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions in 2012. Source based emissions from coal plants, natural gas, and other fuels, emitted nearly 700,000 metric tons. Jeff Simcoe is energy project manager for Downstream Strategies. He co-authored this report.

“We knew that the presence of a power plant would contribute a lot of greenhouse gas emissions in the source based category, we weren’t surprised about that,” he said.

“What we were surprised about on the activity based side is that we were able to identify electricity use as a large contributor, as well as the transportation sector.”

This is the first time Downstream Strategies has attempted to capture the greenhouse gas emissions data from a particular town in West Virginia. Simcoe says he doesn’t think it’s been tried before in West Virginia, by anyone else, either. Downstream Strategies is attempting to figure out these numbers because it’s about to use this study for another project.

“Phase Two of our project will focus on residential use, switching lighting, sealing your home, those types of things to reduce electricity use in commercial homes and businesses, because we see an opportunity there to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in electricity,” said Simcoe.

It’s tricky to compare how Morgantown’s carbon dioxide emissions rank compared to other towns across the region. That’s because Simcoe can’t point to any other towns in the region who are doing a similar kind of comprehensive, wide-sweeping greenhouse gas emission study, using all of the data Morgantown used.

“This is a community-based inventory, versus a city-operations-only or a single-entity inventory. We would be able to compare to inventories that used a similar approach,” he said.

“As far as the U.S. Community protocol that we used, we know in California it’s being recommended that cities and towns use this inventory so they can aggregate the results over larger areas, compare between different cities and start to build a baseline data for an area that they can update over time.”

This study started before the Environmental Protection Agency released proposals to states on reducing greenhouse emissions in the next 16 years. Simcoe is hopeful this report will help the state as it looks to reduce emissions. He points to two specific building blocks the EPA wants states to follow to achieve emission goals.

“Projects like this could help with building block three, which is a more renewable energy type approach, and building block four, which is really focused on demand side energy efficiency,” he said.

“Our phase two project, which will really identify opportunities for residents and business to reduce energy consumption associated with greenhouse gas emissions, is part of building block four.”

Phase Two of the Downstream Strategies project includes conducting a survey to ask Morgantown residents about their energy use. They will also be looking at more energy data. Phase Two will be done by May of next year.

Coal Official: EPA Proposals are Overstepping Its Authority

Mike Duncan is the President and CEO of the American Coalition for Clean Coal and Electricity. He’s disappointed in these proposals on carbon emission cuts, which call for 30 percent in carbon reductions from 2005 levels, by 2030. Duncan says his organization hopes to work with states on a continual basis to come up with solutions.

“We believe the Clean Air Act was not intended for this,” he said.

“We believe that the states have the ability to set these standards that these aren’t national standards, and that states have primacy.”

Under the new regulations, states will have two years to come up with plans to meet these carbon standards. They can also apply for extensions, which could allow them an additional two years to draft a strategy. However, the EPA, according to its proposal, will have to approve of these plans moving forward.

“I expect there will be litigation on both sides. I’m sure the environmental community will want this done faster. On the industry side, you’re going to see manufacturers say this is going to make us not competitive. The coal industry is going to say this is not right.”

There are four public hearings on the proposal, to be held the final week in July, in Pittsburgh, Washington D.C., Atlanta and Denver. Some lawmakers are disappointed that a hearing was not scheduled for West Virginia. Duncan says he hopes to attend one of them.

UMWA Joins Coal Industry to Oppose EPA Regs

The United Mine Workers of America is joining the coal industry in a rare occasion to oppose proposed regulations meant to curb carbon emissions. The industry worries the regulations will financially cripple coal’s economy, as well as West Virginia and everyone dependent on a coal job.

With 95 percent of the energy produced in West Virginia coming from coal fired power plants, many within the industry feel the state will be the hardest hit by the new proposal.

Roger Horton, a retired miner from Logan County paints a grim picture already evolving in coal country.

He sees an EPA ignoring its economic impact on countless coal mining families.

“The uncertainty now that is created by these new regs is going to make even more people apprehensive about being able to keep their homes,” Horton said during a conference call, “and I’m sure there’s going to be more who lose their jobs and have to relocate. That’s just absolutely wrong.”

President of the West Virginia Coal Association Bill Raney told reporters during a conference that the regulations punish people and show no respect for the state.

“Every time we lose a coal miner’s job in this state we lose a piece of West Virginia,” Raney said, “because we lose payroll taxes, hospitalization and contribution to the miner’s retirement and health benefit funds.”

UMWA President Cecil Roberts addresses reporters during a news conference.

That also worries United Mine Workers of America President Cecil Roberts who told reporters that 94,000 people depend on health and retirement funds from the coal industry.

The union, often at odds with the industry, is joining in the fight opposing the regulations.

"Make no mistake about this, without a coal industry there is no one for me to bargain with to extract those kinds of benefits from," Roberts said.

It’s no surprise that coal jobs are disappearing. It’s a trend the state has been facing for years. Since 2012, thousands of West Virginia coal miners have lost their jobs. Some of them are finding relief through federal dollars that pay for training or school to start a new career.

Even without EPA regulations, reports indicate that coal jobs would decline anyway. It’s a finite resource, the coal seams are depleting and energy competitor natural gas is booming.

When introducing the regulations EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said America can “lead this fight” but industry and the UMWA worries no one will follow.

Other reports indicate that China “has begun regional experiments with a more market-friendly approach” pioneered in the U.S. They’re looking at putting a cap on total emissions of sulfur dioxide from power plants, allocating tradable pollution permits to individual polluters.”

West Virginia has already started experimenting with ways to reduce carbon emissions with carbon capture and other technologies.

President and chief operating officer for Appalachian Power, Charles Patton says AEP the largest coal burner in the Western Hemisphere has reduced its carbon footprint by about 21 percent since 2005, and right now, that’s not cheap.

“In doing that we’ve spent across the AEP fleet somewhere north of $10 billion,” Patton said. “What we see is a carbon footprint that is shrinking. We see an industry that has invested billions of dollars and we see customers as a result of those investments that are seeing those electric bills increase 50 percent over a very short period of time.”

Appalachian Power serves about a million customers across West Virginia, Virginia and Tennessee.

The new regulations give flexibility to the states and Patton says he plans to work with Governors in both Virginia and West Virginia.

The EPA is the target of bi-partisan wrath. West Virginia’s congressional delegation is a mix of Democrats and Republicans and all but Senator Rockefeller have sharply critized the proposed regulations.

While lawmakers have talked about it in the past, there was no talk of diversifying the economy on the day the EPA released the proposed regulations.

With New Regulations Coming, What's the Future for Coal?

The Environmental Protection Agency is going to be releasing new rules on carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants in the next few weeks. It’s an issue of great concern for many who rely on coal for work. But some also see it as an opportunity.

About 84 percent of the nation’s total greenhouse gas emissions into Earth’s atmosphere are from carbon dioxide, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, and much of that carbon dioxide comes from burning fossil fuels like coal. The EPA is taking action as, under the Clean Air Act, to enforce cuts in carbon emissions for cleaner air.

In September of last year, the agency put proposed new rules on how much carbon dioxide future power plants may release into the air. This includes capping carbon dioxide emissions to about 1,100 pounds of CO2 per megawatt hour, depending on the size of the turbines in those new plants.

New Rules on the Horizon

While at this point, everything is conjecture in terms of what the agency will seek in its newest regulations, pertaining to existing power plants it is expected that states will have to figure out ways to reduce carbon emissions from their plants substantially in the next 15 years.

There are several ideas over how this can be done, but it certainly won’t be easy for many utilities to reduce emissions right away. One strategy is to do something known as fuel switching. This essentially means instead of burning coal at power plants, technical adjustments would be made to the plant so the facility would essentially burn natural gas instead, or co-fire coal with natural gas, to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

“Some coal plants depending on the technology and the vintage can be switched to burn natural gas. A lot of utilities are looking at this,” said James Van Nostrand, director of the Center for Energy and Sustainable Development at WVU.

“That’s going on now with the wide availability of natural gas, utilities are doing that for economic reasons. That would also presumably will be a compliance option under these regulations. Or you could co-fire some natural gas with the coal, or biomass with the coal.”

Another proposal the EPA is pursuing is for utilities to use carbon capture and storage technologies. This is a method that involves taking the carbon emissions and storing them underground, instead of releasing them into the atmosphere. It’s something American Electric Power tried at a Southern West Virginia plant a few years back: essentially storing the carbon right there at the site, and the whole project took eight years simply to get up and running. But it didn’t work out in the end. Jeffrey La Fleur is a vice president of generating assets at AEP.

“The debate in Congress ended, and they decided not to take up the carbon issue. That debate stopped. We got the stagnation in public policy; the carbon issue got stuck in the mud. Nothing was moving,” said La Fleur.

“When we go to our commissions to get recovery of any cost, we are a public utility, to recover any cost; they are not interested in paying for any technology that’s not required.”

Despite the carbon capture project not working, La Fleur says there are no regrets about that project.

“I think we were successful in doing out with what we set to do. I think it was a great project, I don’t necessarily think we would have done anything differently. I think we would be a lot further down the road now if we had a little more foresight on the government’s part to develop the technology,” said La Fleur.

“That technology is not commercially available. It’s not commercially viable. It’s got to be further developed.”

Needing Resources

That means funding. La Fleur says public utilities that are interested in CCS need the help of the U.S. Department of Energy to get more money to do it. But even with funding, La Fleur says utilities, policy makers, and the general public needs to have patience…because change won’t be coming fast enough for some.

“The EPA is going to come out with a proposed rule in June. Are they going to give the states enough time to get with the companies, to come up with a plan. That I think has been the issue,” said La Fleur.

“We need to have the proper funding to develop the technology going forward.”

Whatever rules the EPA comes out with- some in the coal industry are expected to file lawsuits opposing them.