A group of environmental scientists, after doing some science, have discovered that mountaintop-removal mining is not safe.

These hydrologists, engineers and ecologists, published, just yesterday, their findings in the eminent scientific journal Science. And these aren’t just any old scientists. Some of them are members of the National Academy of Sciences.

According to their article, mountaintop mining is not only unhealthy for the ecology (you know, trees, air, animals, that kind of stuff) but also for human beings that live nearby (Source). The publication of their findings comes just days after the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Corps of Engineers issued a permit for one of the largest mountaintop mining operations to date.

These scientists are calling on the Obama administration to put a stay on any further permits for mountaintop mining.

What a surprise!

Did we really need to wait until the science was done and the findings were published? Couldn’t we have just talked to the residents whose valleys have been filled with tailings and whose streams have been completely obliterated by sludge from the upslope mining?

What about those whose health has been compromised by this practice? Those suffering with resulting lung and kidney problems? Couldn’t their candid testimony have been adequate to put an end to the stripping of trees and vegetation, the removal of topsoil and the blowing up of the exposed rocks to get at the coal seams?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not antiscience. In fact, I am a scientist. I just wonder why it took us so long and so much work to put an end to this a mining method that has such obvious negative impacts on the environment and on people.

President Obama promised during his campaign to rely on science in his decision-making .

Let’s hope he reads the Science article and keeps his promise.

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