In his letter to the editor ("Coal's collateral damage," Oct. 15), David Kwon points out something I have mentioned before and brings up another problem, too.
Kwon complained about a Cavalier Daily article ("'Beyond Coal' gathers support," Oct. 8) that contained some apparently misleading information. Kwon made valid points about how dirty coal is. For example, if a coal fired power plant has "a 99 percent-efficient particle pollution control technology," as the University apparently does, it has a lot of dirty ash at the end of the process. The Environmental Protection Agency is considering whether that ash should be declared toxic waste. But I cannot focus on just one part of the story that Kwon disagreed with.
The story was about a rally held on the Lawn - part of the Sierra Club's nationwide drive to eliminate coal use. The organization's website declares, "From the mine to the plant, to the ash pond, coal is our dirtiest energy source. It causes asthma and other health problems, destroys our mountains and releases toxic mercury into our communities. Continuing our dependence on coal chains us to dirty energy and prevents us from making the changes we need to bring about a clean, secure energy future."
According to The Cavalier Daily story, about 30 people turned out for the rally, which was the work of UVa Beyond Coal and the Sierra Student Coalition. They want to collect 2,000 students' signatures on a petition urging President Teresa A. Sullivan to make the University the first university in Virginia to wean itself from coal.
The story quoted UVa Beyond Coal campaign coordinator Brennen Warner. "With President Sullivan in her first year and being the first female president, we're trying to add another first to the list - the first university to be off of coal in Virginia," Warner said.
The Cavalier Daily also quoted other leaders of the student groups. "We're really working on this campaign to focus the University on leading the way into the 21st century and ending our dependence on coal power," Sierra Student Coalition Organizer Sriram Madhusoodanan said. Madhusoodanan added that the campaign aimed "to draw attention to the fact that our coal dependence is having devastating effects."
One of those effects, according to organizers, is the deterioration of the Rotunda's columns.
As any good reporter would do, The Cavalier Daily's man on this case sought comment from someone with a different point of view.
In this situation, that was Cheryl Gomez, University director of Energy and Utilities. According to the story, Gomez said coal generated about 38 percent of the University's heating energy in 2008. The story also pointed out the University's attempts to mitigate the effects of that. It did not say which of those attempts are required by law. It did say, "the coal the University uses comes from Kentucky, not from harmful mountaintop removal."
Kwon rightly points out that quite a bit of mountaintop removal coal mining goes on in Kentucky, so burning Kentucky coal does not necessarily mean burning coal "not from harmful mountaintop removal."
Even the term "mountaintop removal" is problematic. It has a regulatory definition that does not include many operations that remove mountains.
Kwon, a first-year student, wrote that he studied mountaintop removal in his high school science classes so he knows Kentucky mountains and streams are being destroyed in the quest for coal. He even saw some of those effects as he drove from his Kentucky home to the University.
But Kwon apparently makes a misstatement of his own, claiming "92.2 percent of Kentucky's electricity comes from coal harvested through mountaintop removal in Eastern Kentucky."
The statistics I found say that 92.2 percent of Kentucky's electricity came from coal in 2006 and more than 39 percent of Kentucky's coal that year came from surface mines.
Since more than 60 percent of Kentucky's coal comes from underground mines, it is theoretically possible that the University burns Kentucky coal that does not come from mountaintop removal mines. But in the story, Gomez seemed to be saying that the coal is not mountaintop removal coal because it comes from Kentucky. Maybe that is not exactly what Gomez said. Maybe that is what she said, but not exactly what she meant. There is no way to tell by reading the story.
If the reporter had followed up with Gomez, her meaning may have become clearer and the story may have been more accurate and more informative. That kind of follow-up should be reflexive among reporters. But just as important - perhaps more important - a reporter who researched mountaintop removal coal mining and other coal-related issues before conducting the interviews would have heard an off note in what Gomez apparently said and would have known what kind of follow-up question to ask. Reporters need to know something about the issue they are covering before they go to a rally or press conference or meeting or interview. A little knowledge makes it so much easier to ask the right questions and to get accurate, informative answers.
Tim Thornton is the ombudsman for The Cavalier Daily.
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