In the mountains of Pennsilvania, right in the very heart of coal country, burns a coal mine fire which has been burning since 1962 in a little town called Centrailia. The results of this fire have lead to a gradual poisioning of the town's populace, most of which the Federal Goverment relocated at a cost of $42 million dollars in 1983 to neighboring towns, as well as soil subsistence the likes of which can only be compared to pictures from New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina. Until I had read this article, I was totally unaware that any mine fires existed, and especially unaware that India and China have also experienced mine fires, some of which burn to this very day. There is even a coal seam on fire in Austrailia which has been burning for over 6,000 years. My current state of thinking, reflecting on all I've seen and heard in the last few years, is that we're currently experiencing growing pains again with energy demand. We burn oil and gas in our cars and trucks, burn coal in our power plants, and use natural gas to heat our homes in the winter. When one source becomes cheap, everyone clamors over to use it, then when it is no longer as viable as it once was, everyone switches over to another source, causing market fluctuations and grief for all involved. Time and time again, we are pummeled with figures and stories which tell us that each growing day we persist in using fossil fuels is another day we damn ourselves to a future wrought with the ills of global warming. Every story brings forth values in tons, millions of tons, ranking one country's mass use of fuels against another, and still further comparing the overall implementation of the use of these fuels and how cleanly they are burned. Now, take that, which you can easily find figures on, and add it to the figures generated by all of these mine fires around the world. It's possible, and I'm betting, that the reason why things are the way they are is because we haven't been adding all the numbers correctly and left out a large "X" factor. And I spent so much of my life not even agreeing with the concept of global warming. Centrailia: The 40 year old Mine Fire |
