Mary Anne Hitt
Sierra Club
Shepherdstown, WV, United States
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Past articles by Mary Anne:
Really?! Building a Seawall to Protect Fossil Fuel Plants From Climate Change?
If you ever needed an example of irony and gall all in one package, look no further than Tampa Electric Company (TECO) in Florida. Get this -- TECO is planning to expand a coal and gas power plant and build a sea wall around it to try and save it from sea level rise caused by climate change! → Read More
An Amazing Few Weeks For Beyond Coal
With 285 US coal plants announced to retire and 245 remaining, we’ve made a big difference for our climate and clean air and water, and we have a lot more work to do. And with a remarkable run of successes in just the past few weeks, we have good reason to believe we can get that work done. → Read More
What the Midterms Mean for Moving Beyond Coal
The 2018 midterms created a lot of new opportunities – and some challenges – for our ongoing work to move the US from coal to clean energy. States and cities are where we make decisions about how we produce electricity in this country, and we made progress and gained new champions in some critical places. Here are some of the highlights: In the West, the prospects of a → Read More
Moving Beyond Coal at the Global Climate Action Summit
This week I’m joining leaders from around the world at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco. → Read More
Two Truths and a Lie: Trump Won’t Save Coal or Slow Clean Energy With Clean Power Plan Rollback
The Trump administration’s new, enfeebled policy doesn’t come close to meeting the legal threshold required of the EPA to create safeguards against carbon emissions. → Read More
What’s in Your Water? Trump’s New Coal Ash Regulation Rollback Threatens Families
Although Obama-era coal ash standards were a good first step toward helping to avoid future catastrophic spills, that hope was short-lived. A few days ago, the Trump administration and acting Environmental Protection Agency head Andrew Wheeler finalized their first new regulation to start rolling back the standards protecting our families and waterways from toxic coal ash. → Read More
Corruption is in Wheeler’s Wheelhouse
While we’re happy to see Scott Pruitt’s resignation after his lengthy list of scandals and attempts to roll back clean air and water standards, the Sierra Club will not rest in ensuring that the next Environmental Protection Agency administrator restores public trust in the agency and acts to let the agency fulfill its mission. The acting EPA administrator Andrew Wheeler, a → Read More
Paging Warren Buffett
Coal can’t compete - that’s the headline from a new report focused on PacifiCorp, a major utility in the western US owned by billionaire investor Warren Buffett. PacifiCorp, which operates the largest fleet of coal plants in the West, is - oddly - still fiercely clinging onto coal power even though its coal plants can no longer compete with the cheap renewable energy. → Read More
Colorado Utility Announces Major Move on Clean Energy, Climate Action
This week Colorado’s biggest utility, Xcel Energy, filed a plan to accelerate by a decade the closure of two coal units at its Comanche plant near Pueblo, and to replace that power with the biggest package of clean energy ever proposed in the U.S. for an individual coal retirement. → Read More
One Year After Trump’s Paris Ignorance, Climate Progress Still Being Made
While I was greatly disappointed that Trump intends to withdraw the U.S. from that historic international climate agreement, one year after that move we’re still making some phenomenal progress against climate change -- especially in reducing our reliance on coal, which was our biggest source of climate pollution for decades. → Read More
Trump Needs Another Reminder: Coal is Not Coming Back
In a world where clean energy keeps winning, expanding exponentially, and creating good jobs, President Trump continues to keep his head in the sand - or rather, in the coal dust. Here's why coal isn't coming back. → Read More
Scott Pruitt Continues His Favors for Big Polluters and Puts Our Families at Risk
Some of the regular Americans who are paying the price for Scott Pruitt’s leadership were in Washington, DC this week, and I had the honor of spending the day with them and hearing their stories. → Read More
The EPA's Crisis Deepens With the Confirmation of Andrew Wheeler
Scott Pruitt's scandals are awful, but the Senate also just voted to confirm Andrew Wheeler -- a paid coal lobbyist who has spent the past decade working to water down, undermine, and eliminate safeguards that EPA puts in place to protect the public -- for the #2 position at EPA. → Read More
The Coal Industry Is Leaving Behind a Mess
We already know that the coal industry creates a huge amount of air and water pollution, and now new research is demonstrating once again that coal mining companies are leaving behind huge toxic messes that make economic development challenging for nearby communities. → Read More
Clean Air On The Way As Nation’s Largest Polluter Ceases Operation
This is big news that will literally save lives - in a major clean air and water victory for Dallas-area residents and the nation, today the massive Big Brown Coal plant ceased operations. → Read More
Thankful For The Millions Moving Beyond Coal Globally
I’ve come back home from the United Nations climate talks (COP23) in Bonn, Germany, with so much to be thankful for - namely, for the inspiration from th... → Read More
The Launch Of Europe Beyond Coal
I just arrived in Germany for something remarkable - today’s launch of Europe Beyond Coal, a coalition of groups from across Europe who have been working... → Read More
The Launch of Europe Beyond Coal
I just arrived in Germany for something remarkable - today’s launch of Europe Beyond Coal, a coalition of groups from across Europe who have been working to move their countries beyond coal to clean energy. → Read More
Major Milestone: America Is Halfway To Moving Beyond Coal
This column was co-written by Bruce Nilles, senior director of the Sierra Club Beyond Coal campaign. We have big news to close out a remarkable wee... → Read More
Major Milestone: America is Halfway to Moving Beyond Coal
We have big news to close out a remarkable week of highs (Michael Bloomberg re-investing in the Beyond Coal campaign) and lows (Scott Pruitt’s announcement of a Clean Power Plan repeal): half the coal plants in the US are now announced to retire. → Read More