Appalachia - Mountaintop Removal
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Appalachia: from Mountaintops to Moonscapes looks at the effects of mountaintop removal mining on the environment and local communities in Wise County, Virginia.
Mountaintop removal is a cheaper and less labour-intensive alternative to deep shaft mining that is destroying the local economy, devastating the environment, and harming people. The tell-tale craters, circled with access roads, have been created by explosions aimed at removing the top layers to reveal the coal seams beneath. The air as far as the eye can see is thick with dust. Here and there outcrops of trees cling to the mountainside, remnants of the lush boreal forest that once blanketed the mountain. In the foreground, the veil of grass cultivated from fast-growing hydroseed shows that the reclamation process has begun. However, this falls far short of what would be needed to recreate the centuries-in-the-making biome that existed before mining began.
In her essay for the photobook activist Jane Branham writes, “IfTry it!
