If you want to understand how the methane explosion at Massey’s Upper Big Branch coal mine this week, killing at least 25 people, could have taken place, you need look no further than the records kept by the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration. They maintain a regularly updated list of the year’s 20 most frequent violations of mine safety violations.
The second most common violation of safety regulations in underground coal mines is the failure to plan for ventilation of methane and dust that can cause respiratory disease. As of this morning, there have been 1,125 reported failures by coal mines to comply with methane ventilation planning requirements.
In 2000, there were just 1,453 coal mines in the united states. Not all of those mines were underground operations. Also, recent trends have been toward the reduction in the number of coal mines, so it’s likely that there are now fewer coal mines than there were in 2000.
For there to have been 1,125 failures to plan for ventilation of methane, just within the last three months, indicates that neglect of methane ventilation is rampant in coal mines in the United States.
Why? Why won’t coal mining companies follow the regulations, protect their workers from danger, and come up with plans to ventilate methane in the way that they’re legally required to? The reason is that planning and executing effective methane ventilation costs money, and coal mining companies like Massey Energy are in business to make money. Creating and maintaining ventilation systems cuts the profit margins. Coal is cheap because coal companies regard coal miners as a cheap commodity that can be easily replaced when they are lost.
Of course, the blame doesn’t lie just with coal companies. There is also a failure by the U.S. government to provide incentives for compliance with federal safety regulations. 1,125 violations of regulations for the ventilation of an explosive gas in America’s coal mines, all within the first 100 days of 2010 are made possible by the federal government’s inability to shut down unsafe coal mines.
Government impotence to close unsafe coal mines is the result of political resistance to coal mine safety by members of Congress who come from states where Big Coal is a powerful political force. We’ll look at that problem next.
greed is good.
say it like a mantra, over and over and over.
are you a republican yet?
Wait til the permafrost in Siberia starts melting and releasing its billions of tons of this (far worse than CO2) gas. We’re on a one-way ticket to complete climate disruption (with its attendant deadly impact on us and all other species on the planet), and no one is doing anything about it (in government).