Content Objective
I would like to search for more in my backyard. My backyard is the stripped coal mines on the Navajo Reservation. The Black Mesa Mine is a plateau about a forty-minute drive southwest from Kayenta. Until 1969, the coal was untouched, and the land continued to provide substance to all living creatures. The thick black veins of shiny coal were close to the surface and were visible within gullies and creek beds. I recalled seeing these very thick coal veins when my family used to drive into the pits to extract the shiny coal. The value of black coal was one of the most abundant and choice minerals sought by coal companies and individuals across the reservation. An estimated value of $100 billion provided more energy to the big cities like Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles.
Forty years of striping mining, and the altered land and water usage for transporting the coal slurry from Black Mesa, made profits for the company and cities. These factors promoted progress for stakeholders who invested in coal but not for some view the mining as irreversible damage to the land. Some sixty-five thousand acres were leased by the Hopi and Navajo tribal councils to the Peabody Coal Company of Kentucky, the largest coal producer in the United States.6 Thus, began the mining process.
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