Bluefield Daily Telegraph, Bluefield, WV

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Discussion

July 15, 2009

Area chambers and Pocahontas Coal Association hosting summit

By BILL ARCHER

BLUEFIELD — The southern West Virginia and southwestern Virginia business community will receive a briefing on what Bill Raney, president of the West Virginia Coal Association called, “the watershed of the entire Obama administration,” when the Princeton/Mercer County and the Greater Bluefield chambers of commerce as well as the Pocahontas Coal Association host the inaugural Coal Summit on July 28, at Fincastle Country Club.

“The administration is penalizing the public based on science that no one has a consensus on,” Raney said. “There are still differences of opinion on the science of climate change, but Congress is trying to force a consensus on the public because Al Gore thinks you should a consensus.”

Raney said that Gene Kitts, senior vice president of mining services with International Coal Group and Myron Ebell, director, Energy and Global Warming Policy with the Competitive Enterprise Institute — experts on cap and trade as well as permitting issues — will speak at the summit.

“Gene does a good job of explaining the status of the permitting process for coal mines and Ebell has a good understanding of the cap and trade legislation,” Raney said. “This legislation reaches all the way into everyone’s pocket.”

Raney said he spoke with the leadership of the two chambers, Dan Pochick, president of Rish Equipment and Rick Taylor, vice president of the Pocahontas Coal Association to plan the summit. “We all thought it might work if the chambers brought a wide array of people to the meeting,” Raney said, adding that he hopes that the information will help people attending the summit have more insights into the potential challenges ahead.

“I’m not sure the public really realizes what (the cap and trade legislation) will effect in their lives,” Taylor said. “It’s one of those things that if you say you’re against the legislation, you’re considered anti-environmentalist. I think that coal miners care about the environment. We plant trees. We plant grass. A lot of the forest comes back naturally. Look at the old pictures of McDowell and Mercer counties. You can hardly find a tree, but the forests are back now.”

Deborah Maynard, executive vice president of the Greater Bluefield Chamber of Commerce said that the chambers and the association are patterning the summit after a similar cap and trade legislation summit in Logan in early June.

“This is one meeting where we can address these important issues, and in September, we will host the Bluefield Coal Show. It all goes hand in hand,” Maynard said.

— Contact Bill Archer at barcher@bdtonline.com

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