On November 17^th, 2008 environmental activists, former coal miners, Navajo tribe members and a Wyoming rancher came together in Charleston, West Virginia to discuss the negative impact that coal has had on their lives and their communities.

These people and many more came together to form the Power Past Coal
initiative, an organization created to unify those working to end the destructive forces of coal mining, spearheaded and organized by Sierra Crane-Murdoch, a student at Vermont’s Middlebury college.

Power past coal initiated the 100 days of action, a movement that connected many different anti-coal events throughout the country: one event each day for the first 100 days of Obama’s presidency. By the end of the campaign there were over 300 hundred events, ranging from lobbying days to protests to rallies to teach-ins and permit hearings. In total there were over 300 actions in 100 days in all fifty states; thirty-five organizations joined the project, and four dozen more that participated; and there were over 500 lobby meetings with Congress.

“Our goal was to collect stories from communities impacted by coal …and convince President Obama, the EPA, the CEQ, and our Congressmen and women to enact the policies that would allow our country to “swiftly and justly” transition away from coal,” said Murdoch.

Among these actions was the March 2nd civil disobedience at the Capitol Coal Plant, which shut down operation for four hours and convinced the district to stop burning coal. Similarly, an April protest in North Carolina lead to 44 arrests for trespassing.

The Power Past Coal project was immensely successful, engaging a nationwide network of communities impacted by coal who had never worked together before. And it seemed the government began to listen: over the course of the project there were five mountaintop removal permits revoked, more than twenty new coal plant permits denied, and commitments from the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide from coal plants and coal ash from slurry ponds.