MOUNT STORM, W.Va. (AP) — Down a long gravel road, tucked into the hills in West Virginia, is a low-slung building where researchers are extracting essential elements from an old coal mine that they hope will strengthen the nation’s energy future.
MORGANTOWN — With steam coal being replaced by natural gas and renewables, and a slowdown in metallurgical coal mining for steelmaking, a researcher at West Virginia University sees another use for the state’s coal mines.
West Virginia University, a leader in energy research and innovation, is repositioning the institutes within its Research Office to best meet industry-wide transitions.
The Energy Institute will transform into the WVU Institute for Sustainability and Energy Research, effective July 1, with Sam Taylor as its director. Taylor will build the new Institute on the foundation of the Energy Institute laid by James Wood.
Coal mining can expose minerals like pyrite to oxygen from rainwater and the air. In turn, this pyrite creates sulfuric acid — a toxin to aquatic wildlife that frequently enters water runoff.
MORGANTOWN – The new Richard Mine acid mine drainage treatment plant began operation last week, and on Monday, officials from the U.S. Department of Interior and the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement toured the site in advance of a special DOI announcement (see companion story).
A Montana legislative committee unanimously voted Wednesday to
petition the U.S. Congress to support efforts to pull rare earth
elements from the Berkeley Pit in Butte.
The risks of living near drilling pads are well documented. Radioactive
fracking waste processed at off-site landfills extends those concerns to
other communities.
Strange things have been happening around Rostraver. One of Jack
Kruell’s neighbors died of Ewing sarcoma. Another, Kruell said, is ill
and “on the way out.” Overnight, the plants in his backyard died and
sometimes when he mows his lawn, a silvery dust floats through the air.
Private support from the Colcom Foundation for West Virginia University and the West Virginia Water Research Institute is providing $3.5 million in financial resources to help bolster environmental sustainability and water research efforts at WVU and throughout the region.
The Colcom Foundation, a longtime benefactor of the WVU School of Medicine, is based in Pittsburgh, and focuses on enacting positive environmental change with a focus on aquatic, riparian and terrestrial habitats. Now, the organization is providing additional funds for the West Virginia Water Research Institute that will add a new element to Three Rivers Quest, a water quality monitoring and reporting program supported by Colcom Foundation for more than a decade with upwards of $3.3 million in grant funding.