West Virginia protest calls out #JoeManchin’s dirty coal profits ~ by Palast Investigative Fund fellow @ZDRoberts gregpalast.com/west-virginia-…
The plant the @WV_Rising activists targeted in Grant Town, #WestVirginia, isn’t just any of the over 200 coal power plants still operating in the US. It’s the one where Sen. #JoeManchin makes nearly $500,000 per year selling dirty coal waste called “gob.”
Manchin sells gob (short for “Garbage of Bituminous") for a tidy profit. Activist & retired miner, Michael Whitten says: “When I worked on strip mines, we threw that away..it’s like if you had a wood-burning stove..and you wanted to put wet wood in it—it’s just not economical.” 
Whitten's right. West Virginia customers served by the Grant Town Power Plant, run by American Bituminous Power Partners (AMBit), are being charged more because of the gob. In the last 6 years burning this waste coal has cost the local power utility an additional $117 million.
All of this—even though regulators initially fought the plant’s transition to burning gob—was pushed through thanks to #JoeManchin.
Manchin has been a one-man blockade for climate legislation. That came to a head this year when he essentially killed the Build Back Better bill.
Manchin has been a one-man blockade for climate legislation. That came to a head this year when he essentially killed the Build Back Better bill.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
