[Vision2020] Coal Trains Threaten Environment and Public Health

[Gier, Nicholas]

Hi Bev,

In answer to your question, here is a paragraph from the second installment of my columns on this topic:

Federal law requires that railroads carry coal as cargo, but they cannot insist that the cars be covered.  A closed canopy would increase the risk of spontaneous combustion, and shippers claim that ventilated tops are too expensive.  Some of the trains have their cars coated with surfactant, sometimes called “coal car” hairspray.  Some activists have placed this treated coal in a glass jar and shaken it to simulate a moving coal car.  If the lid is removed, coal dust steams out of the jar giving the distinct impression that it will catch on fire.

I feel really sorry for your cousin.

Nick

A society grows great when old men plant the seeds of trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. 

-Greek proverb



-----Original Message-----
From: vision2020-bounces at moscow.com on behalf of Tom Hansen
Sent: Sat 11/17/2012 4:55 PM
To: Bev Bafus
Cc: vision2020
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Coal Trains Threaten Environment and Public Health
 
You gotta admit, though.  Clinton, Montana has some beautiful lookin' terrain.



Seeya round town, Moscow, because . . .

"Moscow Cares"
http://www.MoscowCares.com
  
Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho
 

On Nov 17, 2012, at 4:28 PM, Bev Bafus <bevbafus at frontier.com> wrote:

> My cousin lives in Clinton MT, and their house is less than 1/4 mi from the railroad tracks. Coal trains pass daily, sometimes as many as 10 in one day. She cannot keep her house clean. Even if she wipes down the walls daily, they still are covered with a black film. The inside and outside of the windows are always gray. The curtains, and other furnishings have to be laundered weekly. And they are breathing this. 
> 
> Why can't they at least COVER the loads?
> 
> Bev
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On Nov 17, 2012, at 3:58 PM, Ted Moffett <starbliss at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> As University of Chicago climate scientist Raymond Pierrehumbert phrased it, "...coal is still the 800-gigatonne gorilla at the carbon party." regarding coals impact on anthropogenic climate change relative to other traditional fossil fuels, excepting methane hydrates, which contain double the carbon of all traditional fossil fuels combined: "Keystone XL: Game over?" 
>> http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/11/keystone-xl-game-over/
>> Info on successful 2012 methane hydrate test well, as well as USGS info on total total methane hydrate carbon: 
>> http://energy.usgs.gov/Miscellaneous/Articles/tabid/98/ID/174/Successful-Test-of-Gas-Hydrate-Production-Test-Well-Ignik-Sikumi-on-Alaskas-North-Slope.aspx
>> http://marine.usgs.gov/fact-sheets/gas-hydrates/title.html
>> "The worldwide amounts of carbon bound in gas hydrates is conservatively estimated to total twice the amount of carbon to be found in all known fossil fuels on Earth."
>> 
>> One very important issue regarding the proposed massive expansion of coal shipments from the US west coast is the local damage in other nations that selling our coal will inflict.  The mercury et. al. pollutants and the respiratory illness from coal burning in nations that are even worse than the US in pollution controls, means selling our coal is complicity in inflicting damage to the health and environment of those nations, apart from also contributing to global climate change.  Why be complicit in other nations exposing their citizens to these harmful outcomes?  For the sake of profit over damage to human lives?
>> 
>> To state "the environmental impact be 'from mines to ports" I suppose has legal relevance for US regulatory bodies or courts, but it's obvious the environmental impacts are from mines to ports to massive pollution in other nations to centuries of destructive global climate change.
>> 
>> To argue Australia and Indonesia will just sell China the coal anyway even if we don't, seems to me a specious moral argument, even if it has short term economic relevance for the US economy. The US should be working day and night to construct international agreements, for a global moratorium on continued burning of coal. To not do so, and to allow massive international sale of our gigantic coal reserves, the largest of any nation on Earth, is to concede that we are not really serious about combating catastrophic anthropogenic climate change, nor combating the damage to human lives and the natural environment that coal inflicts apart from the climate change inducing CO2 emissions.
>> ------------------------------------------
>> Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett 
>> 
>> On Sat, Nov 17, 2012 at 11:45 AM, Nicholas Gier <ngier006 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> Good Morning Visionaries,
>>> 
>>> Some of you may have seen my column or heard my earlier radio
>>> commentary on this topic.  I wish the protesters well in their street
>>> theater in Sandpoint today.  I will join the human coal train with my
>>> own car at the scoping hearing in Spokane on December 4, 3-7 at the
>>> Spokane Fairgrounds.
>>> 
>>> Bellingham and other proposed sites are being promised jobs and new
>>> tax revenue, but Spokane and Sandpoint will get the brunt of 40--60
>>> additional coal trains with very little return.  I suppose that some
>>> train crews will stay and eat in Spokane and Sandpoint.
>>> 
>>> A future column will rebut industry arguments that if we don't sell
>>> coal to China, Indonesian and Australia will simply increase their
>>> exports.  The short response is that our coal will depress the market
>>> and delay the turn to renewable energy that China must make.  Coal use
>>> in the U.S. is dropping dramatically and 100 coal plants will be
>>> phased out over the next decade.  They will be replaced by natural gas
>>> fired plants, wind, and solar.
>>> 
>>> Yours for a coal free future,
>>> 
>>> Nick
>>> 
>>> COAL TRAINS THREATEN ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC HEALTH
>>> 
>>> Plumes of coal dust can often be seen from passing coal trains. I have
>>> often had to avert my face when a coal train passes to avoid being
>>> pelted with coal particles.
>>> 
>>> - William Van Hook, Assistant V-P, Burlington Northern Santa Fe
>>> 
>>> A friend of mine just bought a condo overlooking Bellingham Bay, and
>>> she knew full well that the Burlington Northern tracks were 50 feet
>>> below her balcony.  Later she discovered that each day two coal
>>> trains-125 cars, two locomotives in front and two in back-pass by with
>>> ear splitting horns sounding at every crossing.  They are headed for
>>> Point Roberts, B. C., where huge coal freighters are loaded for
>>> shipment to China.
>>> 
>>> If the coal companies and their allies have their way, the nation's
>>> largest coal terminal will be built at Cherry Point, just north of
>>> Bellingham, where 225,000 barrels of oil are already refined each day.
>>> An estimated 40-60 extra coal trains from southeastern Montana and
>>> Wyoming will pass through Sandpoint and Spokane.
>>> 
>>> Nine trains a day will be redirected to Bellingham, and the remainder
>>> will be sent to other proposed Oregon and Washington ports through a
>>> rail system that is already at 80 percent capacity.  Nearly 140
>>> million tons of additional coal will sent to China from Coos Bay,
>>> Boardman, Longview, St. Helens, or Bellingham each year.  The
>>> developers are no doubt casting a wide net of proposals in
>>> anticipation of activist backlash.
>>> 
>>> The residents of Spokane will have a chance to have their concerns
>>> heard.  The Army Corps of Engineers will conduct a "scoping" hearing
>>> on December 4. Activists all along the rail route are demanding that
>>> the scope of the environmental impact be "from mines to ports," not
>>> just the terminals themselves.
>>> 
>>> The hearings have been billed as the "biggest experiment in
>>> environmental democracy the Northwest has ever seen." The
>>> Environmental Protection Agency supports a comprehensive regional
>>> impact study, and the Army Corps of Engineers has already received
>>> 30,000 letters.
>>> 
>>> The first hearings were held in Bellingham and Mount Vernon. Over
>>> 3,000 citizens attended and 980 people spoke out or wrote comments.
>>> The overwhelming majority of the presenters were against the coal
>>> trains.  It was reported that "opposition speakers ranged from Native
>>> American leaders to retired scientists, organic farmers, commercial
>>> fishermen and birders."
>>> 
>>> One birder testified that at least two bird species may be threatened
>>> by increased rail traffic. The Lummi Tribe testified that further
>>> development at Cherry Point will threaten the spawning grounds of
>>> herring, the main staple of salmon and orca whales.
>>> 
>>> A hearing was also held on San Juan Island where 250 people turned out
>>> to protest the dramatic increase in ship traffic through the narrow
>>> passageways of one of the most beautiful maritime regions of the
>>> country.  The coal ships are so large that they cannot pass through
>>> either the Panama or Suez canals.  Unlike oil tankers they are single
>>> hulled and do not require tugboat escorts. If the Cherry Point coal
>>> port is built, one thousand of these behemoths will clog these tight
>>> waterways each year.
>>> 
>>> Residents along the tracks in Spokane already have higher mortality
>>> rates, partially because of the diesel exhaust and coal dust that
>>> already pollute their neighborhoods.  The dust contains mercury, lead,
>>> arsenic, cadmium, barium, selenium, and other toxic elements. Fish in
>>> the Spokane River already have high levels of mercury.
>>> 
>>> Tests done by the Burlington Northern have revealed that as much as 15
>>> tons of coal dust can escape from an uncovered train after a 567-mile
>>> haul. A spokesman added that most of the loss happens during the first
>>> 100 miles.
>>> A former railway executive who once raised concerns about the
>>> environmental dangers of shipping coal is now a vintner on the Oregon
>>> side of the Columbia River. A video shows him at the bottom of his
>>> property digging up handfuls of coal near the rails, 700 miles from
>>> the mines.  He is afraid that, if coal train traffic increases
>>> significantly, his grapes will start tasting like tar.
>>> 
>>> The people at PowerPastCoal.org report that "already, over 160 elected
>>> officials - including both Sens. Murray and Cantwell - close to 600
>>> health professionals, over 400 local businesses, 220 faith leaders,
>>> close to 30 municipalities and some Northwest Tribes including the
>>> Lummi Nation have either voiced concern or come out against coal
>>> export off the West Coast."  The governor of Oregon and the mayor of
>>> Seattle have joined with these voices.
>>> 
>>> The coal industry promises new jobs and new tax revenues at the local
>>> level, but the negatives far outweigh the positives.  (A follow-up
>>> column will address these points.) Prevailing winds will bring back
>>> the toxins produced by Chinese plants within 10 days, and we will
>>> become complicit in China's contribution to global climate change.
>>> Trains 1.5 miles long will clog traffic, impact economic activity,
>>> hinder emergency vehicles, cause hearing loss, and produce dangerous
>>> air pollution.
>>> 
>>> Nick Gier taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years.
>>> Read his columns on climate change and the environment at
>>> www.NickGier.com/columns.htm
>> 
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