Category: Environment
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Questions Surround Bizarre Telephone Call on Uranium Mining Resolution
By Peter Galuszka Many questions surround the bizarre situation in which a Pittsylvania County supervisor taped and caught in an apparent lie prominent Republican State Sen. Bill Stanley who made a late night call to urge that a resolution involving uranium mining be shelved. It raises questions about the integrity of Stanley, who is one…
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Taped Senator’s Call Links McDonnell to Uranium Mining Controversy
By Peter Galuszka Jerry A. Hagerman, a supervisor in Pittsylvania County which is at the center of a battle over proposed uranium mining, says that State Sen. Bill Stanley (pictured) told him that Gov. Robert F. McDonnell asked Stanley to lobby the county Board of Supervisors to shelve a resolution regarding uranium at its Sept.…
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Did McDonnell Help Quash Pittsylvania Uranium Mining Resolution?
By Peter Galuszka For months, Pittsylvania County has been a hotbed of controversy as Virginia Uranium tries to get a decades-old moratorium on uranium mining lifted so it can mine and refine a rich, 119-million pound deposit of the radioactive material near Chatham. The latest intrigue involves a Board of Supervisors meeting in early September…
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A Suburban Boy Can Survive!
The definition of what constitutes a “sustainable” community continues to evolve as entrepreneurs introduce innovations into the marketplace. A fascinating, if potentially flawed, example is Foxmont in western Fairfax County, which is being developed by environmentalist and attorney Jay Zawatsky. In 300 acres west of Centreville, Zawatsky has plotted 14 five-acre lots for his first…
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Chart of the Day: Virginia’s Clean Jobs
I’m ambivalent about economic studies on the “clean” economy for at least two reasons. First, authors of such studies equate “clean” largely with “low-carbon.” Thus, a nuclear power plant is “clean” because it has no carbon dioxide emissions, even if it stockpiles radioactive nuclear waste, while a natural gas pipeline, which delivers non-polluting natural gas…
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The Madness of Building in Flood-Prone Areas
My skepticism of Global Warming alarmism is well documented on this blog. But being skeptical of chicken-little, the-world-is-going-to-end hysteria is very different from being skeptical of the fact that global temperatures are rising and so is the sea level along with it. We can argue how rapidly sea levels are rising but not the fact…
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Cool Richmond: Two Hours from the Beach… and One Minute from Itself
by James A. Bacon The denizens of River City are ecstatic about Outside magazine’s designation of Richmond as the “Best River Town in America.” The recognition is very cool, considering the competition. Better than Ashville, N.C., and Durango, Colo., cities known for their connection to the great outdoors? Yessss! (Fist pump!) Cynics might observe that…
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After a Town Is Buried, Controversy Still Rages
In Colorado and Virginia residents debate whether proposed uranium mills will help or hinder their economies. by Rose Jenkins To reach the place where an entire town had been dismantled and buried in a Superfund cleanup, I traveled through coils of red rock canyons—sheer cliffs that enclosed the Dolores and San Miguel Rivers in southwest…
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Time to End the Demon-Fuel Mandate
Gov. Bob McDonnell joined six other governors earlier this week in asking President Obama to waive the ethanol quotes mandated by the federal Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS). His letter to the Environmental Protection Agency earlier in the month follows a similar plea from Virginia senators Mark Warner and Jim Webb earlier this month. The RFS…
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Where is Sarah When We Need Her?
By Peter Galuszka It seems so underwhelming. There was the hurricane that went elsewhere. A retrograde platform. A vice presidential candidate in search of a fact checker. A lame speech by POTUS-to-be. Even Clint Eastwood couldn’t make our day. Flash back four years. John McCain stunned the nation with Sarah Palin, the tough hockey mom…
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The Private Sector Strikes Again — Flying Turbines! (No Joke.)
by James A. Bacon I have inveighed repeatedly against the folly of pumping billions of public dollars into solar- and wind-powered projects, whether by means of direct subsidies, loan guarantees or the electric-utility mandates known as Renewable Portfolio Standards. Building and maintaining a vast, expensive energy infrastructure based on uneconomic technology saddles government and consumers…
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Last Year’s Quake Shook Up Virginia Nukes
By Peter Galuszka A year ago tomorrow, Dominion Virginia Power operators watched dozens of brightly-lit boxes strung across several walls in their control rooms for two nuclear reactors at the North Anna Power station about 50 miles northwest of Richmond. It had been a sleepy, sunny afternoon. Suddenly, at 1:51 p.m., delicate sensors noticed that…
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Australians May Dump Pocahontas Parkway
By Peter Galuszka This just in from Australia! Transurban, the Aussie company that owns public-private partnered Pocahontas Parkway near Richmond, is considering selling the toll road because it has become a White Kangaroo. If so, this is incredibly bad news for PPP3 advocates everywhere, including various moderates and conservatives such as Gov. Robert F. McDonnell…
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The Poisoned Well
What can a Superfund site in Colorado tell us about potential uranium mining and milling in Virginia? by Rose Jenkins Sharyn Cunningham and her family drank from a poisoned well for eight years. When they bought property in Cañon City, Colo., in 1994, they had their two wells tested—but just for normal water quality issues,…
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Virginia’s Pathetic Air Pollution Ranking
By Peter Galuszka Despite a glut of less-polluting natural gas as a source of generating electrical power, Virginia is still a significant air polluter, according to a new study by the Natural Resources Defense Council. One person who should take note is Gov. Robert F. McDonnell whose energy choices have always leaned heavily towards fossil…