Almost Heaven (7)

20Mar09

Pleasants County, West Virginia, was recently ranked as the 6th best county to raise a family in the Southeast by the Progressive Farmer.

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Almost Heaven (6)

17Mar09

While discussing public records and identity theft with a friend, I discovered that West Virginia has one of the lowest identity theft rates in the country.  In 2006, the top five states were:

Rank	State	Victims/100,000 Population	Total Victims
1	Arizona	1427.8	9,113
2	Nevada	120.0	2,994
3	California	113.5	41,396
4	Texas	110.6	26,006
5	Florida	98.3	17,780

The bottom five were:

46	West Virginia	30.3	715
47	Iowa	34.9	1,041
48	South Dakota	30.2	236
49	North Dakota	29.7	189
50	Vermont	28.5	178

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Mountaintop Removal

16Mar09

The New York Times today has an editorial calling on President Obama to suspend mountaintop removal until the regulations are revised to end it.

It points out that the coal companies (and Senator Bobby Byrd) insist that “there is no other cost-effective way to dispose of the waste.”

That depends on your definition of “cost-effective.”  I am sure it would be more cost-effective for me to dump my garbage into my neighbor’s back yard rather than pay for trash collection.  My neighbor might not think so.

Only about a third of the value of coal produced in West Virginia is from surface mines, including mountaintop removal mines.  Stopping mountaintop removal is a good first step, but there are many other environmental costs being paid by the rest of us, to the profit of the coal and power companies.

Underground mines produce toxic waste; all mines produce toxic waste-water from washing the coal; and the solid waste from burning coal for electricity is the second-largest waste stream in the country, after municipal garbage.  And then there is the CO2, which is the focus of “clean coal” initiatives.

Coal produces half of the country’s electricity, but other alternatives would be more “cost-effective” if the true costs were all included in the cost of coal and electricity.  Increasing efficiency could cut our electricity use by more than a quarter. A study by the Rocky Mountain Institute showed that there is a huge gap between the most and least efficient states in their use of electricity.  If all states were as efficient as the top states, we would save 30% of all electricity (which would be equivalent to 62% of coal-fired electricity).  Natural gas produces half the CO2 per BTU, little toxic waste, far less destruction of the surface, is already in use for electricity generation, and could bridge the gap until we can bring more renewable energy on-line.  In both cases, the ability is there and being done in some places.  We are not already doing this because coal is cheaper, mainly because the coal industry is not paying its garbage bill.

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Almost Heaven (5)

15Mar09

West Virginia is second only to Texas in the number of active oil and gas wells in the country.

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Almost Heaven (4)

12Mar09

Housing costs in West Virginia are among the lowest in the country.  Since at least 1980, a higher proportion of people in West Virginia have owned their own homes than in any other state.  Three-quarters of West Virginia families own their home, compared to only two-thirds nationwide.

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Almost Heaven

06Mar09

The third in a series of posts of good things about West Virginia.

Unemployment in West Virginia remains among the lowest in the nation.  In December, we were tied for 8th place.

Bureau of Labor Statistics
Civilian labor force and unemployment by state and selected area, seasonally adjusted

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Garden Treasures

06Mar09

Thursday was 60° and sunny, after a low of 8° Tuesday.  With rain predicted for Friday, it seemed like a good day to abandon the library walls and work in the yard.  Raking leaves and pulling up what would seem to be acres of English ivy, if the lot weren’t only half an acre, I found a last-year’s robin’s nest, a bowl of clay coated with twigs inside and out.  Along the path to the gateless back gate, dozens of daffodils were poking through.  We are gradually clearing the grapevines, the ivy, the trash to reveal the ground.  Who knows what other perennial treasures will bloom – summer in a 90-year-old garden should be an adventure.

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Clean Water Act Re-introduced

05Mar09

H.R. 1310, the Clean Water Protection Act, was re-introduced in the House yesterday and referred to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.  Eddie Bernice Johnson of Dallas is Chair of the Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment where it will be reviewed first.  See the full subcommittee list, the full committee list, and the bill summary and cosponsors.   Thank your rep if they co-sponsored; voice your support and ask for the bill to move out of committee promptly if you have a rep on the committee or especially, subcommittee.  There is an easy form here.

This amendment will clarify that “that fill material cannot be comprised of waste” – in other words, mountaintops can’t be dumped into stream valleys.  Last month, there was an appeal decision that allowed the Corps of Engineers to continue approving this – see Friday the 13th, Indeed – so it is even more important for this amendment to be passed soon.

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Can It Be Spring?

01Mar09

Last night, a fall of tiny, perfectly round ice.  This morning, the yard is full of robins.

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Almost Heaven (2)

28Feb09

The second in a series of posts of good things about West Virginia.

West Virginia, like most of Europe, but only 13 other states, has abolished the death penalty.  The last execution in West Virginia was in 1959 and the death penalty was abolished in 1965.

One in every 198 U.S. residents was in prison in 2007; only 1 in 426 West Virginia residents were.

In 2007, the violent crime rate in West Virginia was 275.2 for every 100,000 people, 12th lowest in the country.  The national rate was 466.9.  We were 20th lowest in murders, 5th lowest in rapes, 14th lowest in property crime, with rates well below the national average.

See Thy Brother’s Blood: Capital Punishment in West Virginia

Sources:
U.S. Department of Justice
Bureau of Justice Statistics Bulletin December 2008, NCJ 224280 Prisoners in 2007
Data Online

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