Another article about our November actions. Talya from Michigan State will be one of the students with us Washington, D.C. next week talking to reporters and setting up thousands of pinwheels made by students across the country at the EPA and near Capitol Hill. If you missed it, you can still join the action Dec 1 by posting facebook and twitter messages to Adminstrator Lisa Jackson thanking her for their work to protect public health.
From The Lansing State Journal - Mich.:
EAST LANSING - Talya Tavor owns a "cute little carry-with-me-wherever-I-go nebulizer." It's a device that administers aerosolized medicine, easing the constriction in her airways, relaxing the bronchial muscles so she can breathe.
Her asthma is severe. She's used machines like it for most of her life.
Despite that fact and because of it, she was at the head of a student demonstration at Michigan State University last week, chanting at the top of her lungs.
"What's green?"
"Not coal," the crowd in front of her chanted in reply. All around them, paper pinwheels had been planted in the grass.
Coal has become an issue on MSU's campus over the past several months. Or, rather, the fact that the university's T.B. Simon Power Plant burns close to 250,000 tons of it each year.
Student activists from a number of organizations are pressing the university to find other, cleaner alternatives.
"Mining coal and using it to generate power is the single most destructive industrial process that we have today," said Tavor, president of the MSU chapter of the Sierra Student Coalition and the grass-roots coordinator for the organization's MSU Beyond Coal campaign.
"Because we have a coal plant on campus, we're the ones who are feeling the effects, health-wise, environment-wise."
What the group wants from MSU is a timeline for ending its use of coal, a pledge to move toward renewable sources of energy.
"The university has such an incredible opportunity to re-create its image," Tavor said.
I'm excited about this! Thank you for being so generous with your experience and encouragement.
Posted by: Blue | 06/29/2012 at 12:33 AM
I'm excited about this! Thank you for being so generous with your experience and encouragement.
Posted by: Blue | 06/29/2012 at 12:34 AM