Coal is the largest contributor of hazardous air toxins, as coal refineries are the top contributor of nitrogen oxide into the environment, the largest worldwide source of carbon dioxide emissions and the largest contributor of smog in the nation. Smog pollution disrupts plant growth and reduces crop production, costing an estimated $500 million every year.
Coal Contributes to Air Toxins
Coal is the largest contributor of hazardous air toxins, as coal refineries are the top contributor of nitrogen oxide into the environment, the largest worldwide source of carbon dioxide emissions and the largest contributor of smog in the nation. Smog pollution disrupts plant growth and reduces crop production, costing an estimated $500 million every year. Coal mining and burning is responsible for releasing carbon dioxide and methane, both of which are greenhouse gases that contribute heavily to global warming. Coal is not only the largest contributor to the human-made increase of CO2 in the air, but also generates hundreds of millions of tons of waste products, including flue gas desulfurization sludge containing mercury, arsenic, thorium, and uranium, among other heavy metals. Currently more than 1/3 of ALL carbon dioxide emissions come from burning coal. Coal plants release 59% of all U.S. sulfur dioxide pollution. A single coal plant creates 10,000 tons of sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain, and generates about 3,700,000 tons of carbon dioxide every year.
Coal Disrupts the Ecosystem
Coal mining leads to coil erosion, dust, and water pollution in mining areas. Strip mining requires the removal of vegetation in a given perimeter, removing habitats for wildlife, and waste from strip mining is dumped into nearby valleys, creating flat landscapes and affecting the ecosystem. About 260 million gallons of water are used for coal mining in the U.S. every day. A typical coal plant takes in 2.2 billion gallons of water annually from nearby bodies of water, enough water to support approximately 250,000 people. An estimated 21 million fish egg, larvae, and young fish are drawn into coal plants along with the water intake- this number roughly equates to the number of fish a species produces in one year. More than 1,200 miles of streams have been polluted or buried in Appalachia alone because of mountaintop removal mining. Mountaintop removal mining is the most destructive form of land mining, in which the top of a mountain is blasted apart at the top, dumping millions of tons of waste rock into the valleys and streams below.
Coal Taints Local Water Supplies
Liquid waste from coal mining and the burning of coal produces up to 90 million gallons of coal preparation slurry every year in the U.S., which is mostly stored in large waste pits called impoundments. These impoundments leak into local water supplies and can even burst dramatically, sending millions of gallons of waste barreling down in mudflows and destroying lives and property. Coal companies also continue to inject sludge underground, bury streams, fill in headwaters, and discharge blackwater/coal sludge into our waterways. The U.N. reports that over 1 billion people in the world do not have access to clean drinking water. Burning this liquid coal creates almost double the global warming emissions as the petroleum-based gas we use now, making driving a Hybrid filled with liquid coal equal to driving a Hummer.
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