In a single year, less than one in 100,000 Americans contract a rare form of bone marrow cancer. In Pennsylvania coal country, the rate is 15 times higher.
This chilling stat opens an eye-opening, heart-rending short documentary produced by the American News Project. The video portrays the story of local residents suffering from coal ash that is poisoning their water and, many contend, making them ill. (Yes, it’s not just the smokestack air pollution that threatens our health.)
Make no mistake: No matter how many millions of dollars Big Coal spends on PR to spew its propaganda, there is no such thing as “clean” coal.
The same goes for the dubious process of converting coal into liquid as a alternative to oil for transportation. This “dirty fuel” has all the negatives of solid coal – from mining to toxic emissions – with the added touch that the process to create liquid coal doubles global warming pollution. NRDC’s movie on this – Crude Substitute– profiles yet another eastern Pennsylvania community suffering the consequences of dirty coal.