Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Ben Ramsey & Jared Jaggers (THURS)
Mountain top removal mining takes the business of mining from an unfortunately detrimental necessity to a grotesque display of environmental negligence. This process is used to access Appalachian coal seams by blasting off the top of a mountain, exposing the coal so it may be easily harvested. The rubble and refuse of this process is then dumped into the valley, contaminating tributaries with heavy metals and coal slurry. This reckless strategy destroys some of the richest ecosystems in the United States while simultaneously misleads and impoverishes communities in the Appalachians. Mountain top removal mining violates land ethic, and is a simple example of a bigger problem of applying a cost effective rather than value effective analysis for industrial protocol in America.
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Are there any mining techniques that are less destructive to the ecosystems in the mountain ranges? If so, how could we enforce mining companies to use those techniques, regardless of extra cost of using those techniques?
ReplyDeleteAre there any laws or consequences we could setup for those who this type of mining? Also, how could we promote less destructive methods of mining?
ReplyDeleteBy looking at the GAIA hypothesis this ethically seems unjustified. If there was some way to instill this mentality, there might be a means of change. However, most likely this theory will not be adopted by the coal industry, but is there a way to legally make them clean the water and land affected by this capital-seeking act? If there is no other way to extract the coal, then there most definitely must be a law to enforce a more environmentally sound way of action.
ReplyDeleteWhat options aside from laws and regulation are available to stop this practice?
ReplyDeleteWhat are the best alternatives to coal which could possibly render coal-mining altogether unnecessary?
ReplyDeleteWhat are the incentives for the mining companies to stop their current practices?
ReplyDeleteWhat other option exist? It seems like the one's partaking in this are acting out of a utilitarian and egoistic frame of mind, reaping a profit from depleting the mountain with little care of the cots to other, so what incentive would they have to change their actions? Can the government regulate this? Out law this? tax this?
ReplyDeleteA quarter of the world’s coal reserves are in the United States and the energy content of these reserves exceeds that of the entire world’s known recoverable oil. If we completely stop MTR, 56% of the current electrical energy produced for Americans would cease and costs of electricity would increase to the point that a majority of Americans would no longer be able afford electricity in their homes. Furthermore, struggling states like West Virginia who depend on mining would be in economic ruin. While I agree that MTR is environmentally unsound, is it really up to the government and corporations that employ this method of mining to stop/try to find another means of production or Americans as a whole to reevaluate the energy exhausting lifestyles they are currently living?
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ReplyDeleteWhich of the ethical theories are you going to use in support of your paper?
ReplyDeleteThe land ethic is a sound argument against mountain top removal and clearly a more sustainable method of extracting coal needs to be adopted. However how would you deal with a Utilitarian argument? If what Brent said is true then one can argue the following:
ReplyDeleteFactor endowments such as land rich with natural resources ought to be used for a country's benefit.
Coal extracted from MTR leads to the greatest benefit for the greatest amount of people (albeit to the detriment of a small proportion). Therefore MTR should continue.
Using the utilitarian argument can also be a little tricky. In judging an act as morally good or bad, what aspect of efficiency is one to take into account? Yes, MTR is very efficient in regards to coal extraction, but it is also has many negative effects. Since MTR became popular, the number of people employed by the coal industry in West Virginia has gone from 130,000 to less than 20,000. What bearing does this have on the efficiency of the coal industry? What if this unemployment rate negatively affected more people than were positively affected by the coal industry?
ReplyDeleteForgive my ignorance, but when and why did mountain top removal become the standard for coal mining? I understand that mountain top removal is easier in practice than other forms of mining, but I think that in order to argue the benefits of alternative options, it would be interesting to look at why coal miners chose mountain top removal over some other method.
ReplyDeleteWhat are the environmental regulations that have failed and how should they be restructured to prevent future damages?
ReplyDeleteMountain top removal affects all kind of species as their habitats are destroyed. Aside from the adverse affects on communities, how could Bentham's arguments for the protection of animals be applied to this?
ReplyDeleteMountaintop removal can be an infringement on certain people’s rights. How is mountaintop removal an infringement on peoples rights who live in the area and what definition of rights is this a violation of?
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of laws are in place to protect the people and the environment? Because this is not only a disregard for the land ethic, its very egotistical for a very small group(coal company). What does this say about the ethical pronciples of our governement that just lets the damage happen?
ReplyDeleteHow much more difficult is it to access the coal by tunneling in? Is it that much more expensive? If you did a cost-benefit analysis of the money saved against the impact on Appalachian communities would the result still be the same?
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