Tennessee Coal Ash Sludge Spill Photographs

Dear Antrim, thank you for posting these remarkable and historic photos. From where I am I hear very little of this coal ash sledge except on democracynow. Why isn’t this being covered more by the media in America? I looked at cnn yesterday, their headline story was that when Michelle Obama first met Barak, she thought he was cute. Tell me has it always been like this? Or is it that this is not poster photos for “clean coal mining.”
Antrim, thank you for doing this, its horrific! Your photos are spot on and very moving!

It’s been all over local news here in Arkansas. Georgia not so much, but I’ve seen a lot of info since i’ve been visiting family here in Arkansas. Pretty amazing stuff. Wish I had been in the area to document. They use the same type of coal ash here in my family’s area as well. Hope it never happens here.

The funny thing is that I checked the mail two days ago at my parents house and of course there was a flyer in the mail about how important it was for local Americans to push the government to invest in clean coal and natural gas, while also expanding oil drilling.

Of course this mailer pamphlet was from the coalition of oil and natural gas companies.

Amazing that after this coal ash spill, they are still spinning about clean coal and drilling and whatever else the big corporations are willing to sacrifice for profit. I hear this is worse than the Exxon spill…my question is still, why doesn’t it get the attention that spills like the Exxon one and others got? And are they cleaning up? Is anyone being held accountable?

Great pictures of a real tragedy Antrim. Hopefully the TVA will do a proper cleanup.

- s.

Hi All, thank you very much for your comments…the latest is that independent testing of the water at the breach site and two miles down reveals 300 to 30 times, respectively, of elevated arsenic levels. All their water samples contained “elevated levels of arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury , nickel and thallium,” according to Appalachian Voices’ website.
http://www.appalachianvoices.org

These poisoned waters of the Emory and the Clinch Rivers are tributaries of the Tennessee River, which feeds into the Mississippi River in southern Tennessee near the border of Arkansas. Heavy metals sink into the mucky river bottoms and according to scientists will take generations to recover.

The question is: Are we going to continue using coal fired power for 50% of our electricity??
That is where we are now, and as some have mentioned, there is a concentrated (39million in 2008) public relations campaign to convince Americans that coal is clean and carbon neuteral. This is utterly false.

Antrim, moving pictures. I am working on a project about MTR in E. TN at the moment, and of course, I was unable to make it up to Kingston when this happened. Do you think it would still be worth it for me to make the trek? I am about two hours away. I am very interested in your work about coal and appalachia. cheers

-Alex

posted on Alternet.org today:
Can America Clean Up from Its Worst Environmental Disaster? [Contains Photo Slideshow]
http://www.alternet.org/water/116933/

I’m currently in Tennessee, conducting follow up reporting.

Wow. Get the word out, loudly.

There IS one way to do Clean Coal- and the company who can do it are now beet by the US Patent Office. Who need no mining, or sludge ponds!

Global Resources Corp. can convert bituminous coal in a vacuum into hydrogen and methane, or oil and natural gas, depending on the microwave frequency they approach it with. No CO as it is done in a vacuum and cannot oxidize. They can also take dredge sludge, and isolate the petroleums, metals and organics and return it as clean sand. Again, in a vacuum. With a resulting fuel and metals for commodity use.

Look into these guys. The big oil and coal, with old world mining tools, do not want this out there.

God bless you, Antrim. When the media won’t- we must.

hi kevin,
welcome to lightstalkers, I see you just joined today…thank you for your comments, but sadly to get the bituminous coal, you have to extract it from the earth. In itself, the extraction of coal is a complete and utter nightmare for those living nearby the operations, including mountaintop removal coal mining, blasting, poisoned water and air, high speed coal trucks traveling on rural mt. roads…Kevin, there is no such thing as ‘clean coal’ From Craddle to Grave, Coal is filthy. It’s time to Quit Coal.

The typical extraction of coal, and oil, is utterly distructive, profit [not human] scale, and pathetic, I agree totally. Global Resources understand this. No more mines, blown up mountains, or any of that. Microwave “ovens” can point downward into the coal in the ground, and vaporize it in the ground, where, in a vacuum, it is removed as a gas. It can be refined onsite with a portable fraction stack. Please- disagree. But verify. There are articles online, Frank Pringle who invented this process, and Global Resources Corp. Google them first. Then lets talk. It is time to quit the Huge Corporate coal and oil slavery! but if we can get fuel from toxic wastes [even tires…] why should we be sending money to Saudis?

These are extraordinarily strong and important images. Thank you for posting them. And I’m damned glad this work is getting some attention.