The truth about Joe Manchin? He's a coal baron of the dirtiest kind. Literally. [View all]

[hedda_foil]

There were a couple of articles about this last week but they were mostly ignored. Not this time, I hope.

First:https://theintercept.com/2021/09/03/joe-manchin-coal-fossil-fuels-pollution/

JOE MANCHIN’S DIRTY EMPIRE
Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, speaks to members of the media at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Wednesday, July 28, 2021. Senators negotiating the terms of a $579 billion infrastructure plan chipped away at some of the issues that had been holding up an agreement but have yet to find a breakthrough on other differences that would seal an agreement and lead to a vote on legislation.

“If you’re sticking your head in the sand, and saying that fossil [fuel] has to be eliminated in America, and they want to get rid of it, and thinking that’s going to clean up the global climate, it won’t clean it up all,” Manchin told CNN after a private meeting with President Joe Biden and his fellow Senate Democrats. “If anything, it would be worse.”

Though Manchin’s motivations are often ascribed to the conservative, coal-friendly politics of West Virginia, it is also the case that the state’s senior senator is heavily invested in the industry — and owes much of his considerable fortune to it.

For decades, Manchin has profited from a series of coal companies that he founded during the 1980s. His son, Joe Manchin IV, has since assumed leadership roles in the firms, and the senator says his ownership is held in a blind trust. Yet between the time he joined the Senate and today, Manchin has personally grossed more than $4.5 million from those firms, according to financial disclosures. He also holds stock options in Enersystems Inc., the larger of the two firms, valued between $1 and $5 million.

Those two companies are Enersystems Inc. and Farmington Resources Inc., the latter of which was created by the rapid merging of two other firms, Manchin’s Transcon and Farmington Energy in 2005. Enersystems purchases low-quality waste coal from mines and resells it to power plants as fuel, while Farmington Resources provides “support activities for mining” and holds coal reserves in the Fairmont area. Over the decades, whether feeding tens of thousands of tons of dirty waste coal into the power plants in northern West Virginia or subjecting workers to unsafe conditions, Manchin’s family coal business has almost entirely avoided public scrutiny.
https://theintercept.com/2021/09/03/joe-manchin-coal-fossil-fuels-pollution/

Also https://www.vice.com/en/article/z3x8bw/joe-manchin-senator-millions-coal-grant-town-west-virginia

Joe Manchin Makes $500K a Year From One of the Dirtiest Coal Plants in West Virginia
That’s more than twice his salary as a U.S. senator

Joe Manchin, the conservative Democrat from West Virginia who is the linchpin of his party’s climate agenda, made nearly $500,000 from one of the most polluting coal power plants in West Virginia last year alone.

According to his most recent financial disclosure, Manchin gained $492,000 last year due to his non-public shares in a coal company called Enersystems, which records show is a contractor for a power plant in the state’s north that burns waste coal.

Meanwhile, Manchin’s 2020 income for being a senator was $174,000. “He’s making more than twice as much selling coal as he is serving as a representative,” said Jim Kotcon, the conservation chair of the West Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club.

Due to impurities in the waste coal Grant Town Power Plant burns to generate electricity, it releases more sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide per unit of energy than any of the state’s coal plants, according to 2018 calculations from Kotcon.

“In terms of both of those pollutants,” Kotcon told VICE News, “it’s still the dirtiest plant operating in West Virginia today.”

https://www.vice.com/en/article/z3x8bw/joe-manchin-senator-millions-coal-grant-town-west-virginia

Want more? https://www.google.com/search?q=joe+manchin+coal+mining&rlz=1C1CHZN_enUS956US956&oq=manchin+coal&aqs=chrome.2.69i57j0i512j0i22i30l2.6730j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8