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Other Voices: Repairing the Damage in Appalachia (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
For generations, fossil fuel companies have extracted immense wealth from Appalachian communities, enriching other parts of the country at the region’s expense and leaving behind abandoned coal mines and orphan wells. Robust federal spending to repair this damage will improve quality of life and create thousands of jobs in distressed, rural areas of Appalachia, ORVI researchers Eric Dixon and Ted Boettner write. |
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Federal Infrastructure Packages Projected to Save Lives, Offer New Economic Life in West Virginia (Charleston Gazette-Mail)
In May, Senior Researcher Sean O’Leary delivered a 33-page testimony outlining the Centralia, WA model for economic revival to the West Virginia Public Service Commission, which was considering the 2028 retirement of the Mitchell coal-fired power plant in Marshall County. His testimony didn’t receive much fanfare then, Mike Tony writes, but “momentum toward federal infrastructure spending,” namely, the $100 billion energy infrastructure bill advanced by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, “could change that.” |
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Proposed Ohio Cracker Plant Awaits Final Air Permit Decision; Still No Partner for Project (Columbus Dispatch)
The PTT Global Chemical ethane cracker, proposed for construction along the Ohio River, may have to apply for new air permits if the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency denies a revision to Ohio law that would allow for an extension of the company’s permit, Beth Harvilla writes. Senior Researcher Sean O’Leary added that the company’s recent acquisition of German coating resins company Allnex casts shadows over the Belmont County cracker’s financial situation. “The company’s pool of existing capital has been reduced, which means that if PTTGC proceeds with the cracker, it will have to rely even more heavily on a partner or on markets to provide the capital, the very thing the CEO has said he was glad to avoid,” he said. |
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New Report Finds Significant Cleanup Needed at Coal Mines in the East (Appalachian Voices)
A new report from Appalachian Voices, the Ohio River Valley Institute, and Reimagine Appalachia estimates that 633,000 acres on mines still held by coal companies in the East require some degree of reclamation, at an estimated cost of $9.8 billion. Cleaning up these mine lands could provide 2,300 to 4,500 jobs annually. “At this point, it’s imperative that state mining agencies and the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE) work together to determine the outstanding cost and amount of reclamation mines still held by coal companies [to begin a comprehensive cleanup effort],” said lead author Erin Savage, Senior Program Manager at Appalachian Voices. |
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The Fracking Boom Is Over. Where Did All the Jobs Go? (MIT Technology Review)
In Pennsylvania, the “Saudi Arabia of natural gas,” and across Appalachia, “the numbers show that gas drilling has not lifted the financial outlook of shale communities. In fact, it may have made things even worse,” Colin Jerolmack writes. A “bombshell report” from the Ohio River Valley Institute details how the 22 counties in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia that produce most of the country’s natural gas saw falling populations and stagnant job growth from 2008 to 2019, even as economic output grew by 60%.
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Report Offers Case Studies for How Pennsylvania Could Help Areas Affected by RGGI (State Impact Pennsylvania)
A recent ORVI report explains how revenue from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a cooperative, eleven-state effort to cap and reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector, could play a critical role in helping Pennsylvanian coal communities “replace lost tax revenue for local governments and school districts, prepare coal plant sites for reuse, and fund economic planning efforts.” The report offers case studies of coal communities in NY, MA, CO, and WA to demonstrate how RGGI funds could help ease the economic reverberations of coal plant closures.
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The Failures of Fracking (H Magazine)
A recent ORVI report exposes the false promises of the fracking boom, which failed to deliver growth in jobs and local prosperity despite the claims of industry proponents. “While people can support the industry, they shouldn’t want to support a bad deal, and that’s what they’re getting right now,” said Senior Researcher Sean O’Leary.
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