Akula,

Lots of information there.

Thank you.

This same ferocious debate is continuing in the Appalachian mountains of southeastern Kentucky, where the mines are not just being proposed but are operating, day after day.

Kentucky is the third-largest producer of coal in the nation, with some 17,000 jobs tied to the industry, more than a billion dollars in direct wages being paid a year and some 90-plus percent of our electricity coming from coal-fired power plants. Numerous manufacturers (Kentucky is also the third-largest producer of cars and light trucks in the nation, a fact few people know) depend on the state's cheap electricity to exist. Families depend on those jobs to eat.

But many people argue -- and in some cases, quantify their arguments -- that the destruction of the landscape and the impact on people's lives (contaminated water, torn-up roads, unstable sludge ponds, broken foundations and runaway boulders from strip-mine blasting, ghost towns etc.) far outweighs the benefits from mining. And the air around those plants is toxic, environmental advances notwithstanding.

A friend of mine, Erik Reece, wrote a critically acclaimed book called "Lost Mountain" about a version of strip-mining called mountaintop removal, in which hilltops are literally blown up to get at the seams of coal, with the trees, the topsoil and waste rock then bulldozed into the valleys. The cut-and-fill creates somewhat level land, which is being touted for development but is rarely used.

The effect, really, is a lunar landscape. Some of the companies are working hard to reclaim the land with fast-growing grasses, and indeed some of their success has enabled Kentucky to import (reintroduce, actually) elk from out west. We now have the largest elk herd east of the Mississippi.

If my writing seems kind of strained, it's because I'm trying to write without passion and present an unbiased view (Erik, by the way, wrote under no such constraints -- his book eviscerates the industry so skillfully that it caught the attention of the New York Times and many well-known writers and environmental organizations.)

It's difficult not to be outraged. Kentucky's mountains (OK, more like big, big hills) and its deciduous forests contain some of the most biologically diverse land in the country, and it's shocking to see the destruction.

The mere suggestion that similar operations could set up shop along some of the most pristine waters and beautiful country in the world (in the north woods) sends a shudder through me. In fact, I want to weep.

And I read this sentence with some misgiving: New governmental regulations require mine operators to post cash bonds, to ensure that reclamation activities and monitoring will be carried out even if the company goes bankrupt down the road. Kentucky finally clued in years ago and started requiring such bonds too, since so many companies were filing "bankruptcy" at the end of the extraction, then reforming under a different name to escape any legal obligations. Unfortunately, rarely have the bonds been large enough to allow much reclamation. And reclamation -- though full of green, grassy hillsides -- is a poor substitute for deep woods and lush mountainsides.

Having said all that, I recognize:

1 -- What happens in Kentucky and in Minnesota might be different.
2 -- The mines, as you say, might not be anywhere near the lakes. Mining techniques are advancing all the time.
3 -- Jobs and energy are important. (Am I willing to stop using electricity?)

So .... forgive me for writing so long. I could write a lot longer, believe me. And forgive me for being a hypocrite. Even as I weep at the thought of decimated landscapes, I'm typing on a computer powered by coal-fired electricity.

-- kypaddler