Digressions: A Blog

Plume Finished

With the previous post from last summer’s travels, I’ve now put everything I’ve done in Appalachia online. I started writing a fellowship proposal in 2006 to photograph mountaintop removal when I was a student in Baltimore. The trip that resulted lead me to discover Southern Ohio, which then lead to another few years of traveling to the region to make a second project, Plume. And so between Plume and Removing Mountains, I think I’m done with making work about coal, at least for now. The traveling, editing, and writing spanned nearly 5 years. I’ve become a completely different person in that period, from age 21 to 25.

When I decided to do a follow up project to Removing Mountains, I began thinking about a book. I wanted it to be in 3 chapters, the final chapter encompassing a project that was not directly tied to the region, but the broader philosophical and social issues I was addressing through the coal industry. This spring I applied for a state arts grant to make that third project, loosely about the mythology surrounding American industrial history, but didn’t receive it. Simultaneously, over the course of the last couple years, I’ve been heading back into the studio to continue the much more interdisciplinary practice that I had developed while in school. I spent the last 6 months applying to grad school with this work, and starting this fall, I’ll be attending an MFA program at the University of Illinois at Chicago. It’s a small, very interdisciplinary program with a lot of momentum and growing attention, and I’m very excited to be heading back to school. What this all means is that for now, the photographic series, the form I’ve been working in for the last 4 years or so, will be put on hiatus as I continue experimenting in the studio. Photography is very much still part of my practice, just in a very different way.

This blog has always mostly been about photography; work and artists that I like, and the process of traveling and making work in coal country. Because I’m not working on those projects anymore, I’m not sure what this blog will house. It’s not dead, just tranisitioning.

In the meantime, if you click the drop down menu for categories in the side bar and select “Project: Southeast Ohio” you can see all the posts that detail the making of Plume. And here is a link directly to the old version of Digressions, and specifically all the posts related to the making of Removing Mountains. This was a lot of work.

There have been a lot of people who have read these posts and commented and wrote me emails over the years – thank you for your support. And again, thank you to all the people that financially made the work possible, those who bought prints every summer during the print sales.

For more frequent updates I have a Tumblr, and be on the look out for a majorly updated website in the next week or so.

¶ Posted 30 March 2011 † dshea § blogtalk § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (0) °

Driving Through Ohio, Summer 2010, #4

¶ Posted 21 March 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (2) °

Ohio Revisited

Old Coal Supports:

2010

2009

Racine, Ohio:

2010

2009

Paul Cardone (and his model coal town):

2010

2009

¶ Posted 18 March 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (4) °

Jay

Jay is a guy I met first in 2009. I wrote about him last year (read for background information) and how I wished I would have spent more time with him, not just the people he directed me towards. Last summer I did just that. Since I last saw Jay he had a child, who he named Gavin after the power plant:

Jay and Gavin

This time around he had a new cast of characters for my story. Jay is a successful real estate developer, independent contractor, and small business consulter. As part of his real estate venture, he houses coal industry employees who come in from out of state. The fact that coal’s presence in SE Ohio assumes an important role as “job provider,” I’ve always really wanted to photograph one of the multiple employees that the companies bring in from out of state (it’s often cheaper for them to contract labor this way):

I met up with Jay a few times, once at the site of a house he was renovating, that would eventually house more out of state coal workers. I met a local young guy who worked for Jay and other contractors, as he could find the work:

And finally, Jay’s responsible for introducing me to an older couple who has lived in Racine for a long time. They’ve been dubbed “Racine’s Daily Walkers” because of their long daily walks around town:

¶ Posted 16 March 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (3) °

Foreclosed Trailer, Ohio 2010

¶ Posted 14 March 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (2) °

Driving Through Ohio, Summer 2010, #3

¶ Posted 04 March 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (1) °

Slurry and Reclamation

Water is a very important element to Plume. I really struggled when trying to find a way to photograph the various bodies of water in a way that was compelling and made it clear how important water was to the region and industry. Water carries the coal from various places along the Ohio River to the plants (in addition to coal trucks). All of the small towns I was photographing are along this same body of water, doubling as an integral industrial thoroughfare and a site of recreation and regional locality. I mention in my statement that the river plods slowly, and the people tend to reflect an ambivalence that can be felt sitting on the river bank. And unsurprisingly, so many of the environmental and human problems that burning and extracting coal presents are found in the form of water.

Most power plants produce a slurry, which is liquid fly ash, a by-product of coal combustion. You might have heard of the stuff from a spill in Tennessee or more famously, the Buffalo Creek disaster. I really wanted to photograph a slurry pond in SE Ohio, but was unable to find an access point in 2009. Around that time, a report was released that included some of the top EPA regulation violators, and near the top of that list was the ash pond behind Gavin Power Plant. On a late afternoon this past summer, I drove down a side road I had previously overlooked and it took me to a gate owned by the power plant. There was no fence and no guard, just some very large power lines and a large hill:

I could hear the hum of the lines and also distant trucks moving fly ash. Nobody seemed to be too close, so I walked across a large field and up the hill, about half a mile into AEP property. At the top of the hill, here is a look back on where I came from:

And on the other side:

In full view was the toxic slurry pond for the Gavin plant. I was hiking along a main road used by trucks (all on very, very private property) and completely exposed. I made the decision to continue to walk along the ridge to photograph the pond, knowing that there was absolutely no place to duck and hide if I truck came. At one point I saw a truck in the distance and sprinted full speed 800m to the nearest brush. This is especially hilarious considering I had all of my gear, a tripod with a 4×5, a large backpack, and a Mamiya 7 bouncing wildly as a sprinted across the ridge. It was a Sunday afternoon and probably the only chance I’d get to shoot the pond. The power of context is amazing – the light was fading and beautiful, and from a distance, the pond looked equally beautiful.

A couple weeks earlier I had found my way onto some of the largest contiguous reclaimed strip mining sites each with their own body of toxic water. This how Google Maps renders it:

The pin point is Big Muskie Bucket. Here are a few images from that track of land:

Here is a satelliete view of the specific ponds pictured above:

¶ Posted 23 February 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (0) °

Mountaineer Power Plant Part 2

When I went back this last summer to photograph Mountaineer, there was only one photo I had in mind. I wanted to photograph the point at which carbon was leaving the “above ground” and being pumped underground. Again, to my surprise, the plant was really nice and accommodating. They told me there was a single wellhead but that it was really boring and insignificant looking, which is exactly what I was hoping it would look like. The first time I was there I couldn’t photograph anything that had to do with carbon sequestration because they were days away from starting the process. In the year since, they’ve been giving consistent tours to companies and groups from around the world interested in implementing a similar system.

When I arrived again I sat down with Charlie and talked for over an hour about energy policies. This time we really focused on carbon capture and emissions. And again, at the end of the conversation (just like in 2009) Charlie really wanted to drive home the point that there is no singular solution to carbon emission. Solar power, for example, will not change the face of energy production and consumption alone. And on that point, I couldn’t agree more. Realistically, what I imagine a push away from oil and fossil fuels looking like is this: widescale state and federal enforcement of current mandates aimed at protecting citizens and the environment, such as the Clean Water Act. Heftier fines and more severe punishment for violating EPA standards. Federal subsidies for consumers, especially in cities, that chose to plug into alternative energy sources. Incentives for energy consumers that prove that they’ve reduced their energy consumption by at least 10% in a single year. Doing this will create a culture of conservation and awareness, and let’s be honest, economic incentives are what get people interested in these things on a large scale. As the culture changes and social consciousness surrounding energy evolves, companies will take note and start investing in alternative energy research and development. Consumers will be using less energy, which will hypothetically coincide with a slow transfer to sustainable resources that provide energy, although less efficiently (wind and solar for example).

Mountaineer cooling tower.

Mountaineer generator output.

Carbon underground storage wellhead.

Pipes leading to the wellhead.

Smoke stacks.

Mountaineer power plant.

¶ Posted 19 February 2011 † dshea § my work § project: southeast ohio ‡ Comments (3) °

Mountaineer Power Plant Part 1

Mountaineer Power Plant

It’s extremely difficult to photograph power plants on company property. If you look at projects that tackle power plants or involve power plants in some way, you’ll notice that most images are shot from a distance, across the road, or are photographed in a way that hides most of the foreground. Coal companies guard their mine operations obsessively and the companies that own the burning end of the industry are the same way. I was completely surprised to get an email response from one such plant in SE Ohio in 2009. On top of that, it was the plant manager, the guy with the biggest office, responding to my request for a tour and access to photograph on the grounds.

When I arrived to Mountaineer for the first time, J.L., a plant employee that handles public relations and group tours met me and brought me to Charlie’s office, the plant manager. J.R. quietly closed the door behind us and Charlie sat for a moment looking at me. Charlie finally set “We’ve been reading about you and the work you’ve been doing in West Virginia for awhile this afternoon. We want to set the record straight.” I felt like I had walked into a total ambush. Online, most of what is easily searchable about my coal projects doesn’t come across as strictly anti-coal. That being said, the projects document the destructive nature of mountaintop removal, the often percarious practices of coal companies, and the culture and people surrounding the issues. The photos aren’t flattering to the coal industry, but I try to maintain a neutrality in presenting the work. Charlie and his friend had gone back and dug deep into the archives of my blog to find daily travel stories and more opinionated ranting about the situation in Appalachia.

We sat for an hour and a half to discuss the current energy and fiscal situation. It was clear that they had a strict agenda, so I let them talk. I barely said anything, a few times interrupting to remind them that I’m a journalist (I use the J word only when traveling, it’s often the fastest and most effective way to explain what I’m doing) and interested in photographing without an agenda (a soft lie). I didn’t remain quiet out of fear or because I was afraid of entering an ideological battle. I really wanted to listen to their position and to see if they believed everything they said. And I think they did. Their position was mainly this: coal needs to be burned and people need electricity. Someone has to do the job. It’s dirty, kind of, but we’re doing everything in our power to make it as clean as possible. The far-left environmentalists are demonizing us specifically, and failing to understand the reality of the energy situation in this country. Coal has a long life ahead of it and carbon sequestration will work. Etc.

It wasn’t anything I hadn’t heard before, but they said it with such conviction and personal commitment that it was impressive on some level. Charlie emphasized that most employees were proud of their jobs and lived in the local communities. They cited several statistics that seemed wildly inaccurate (including some dubious claims about coal’s zero carbon footprint over the “long run”), and were dedicated to painting anyone with remotely anti-coal attitudes as extremists hell bent on dismantling the energy infrastructure as soon as possible. Charlie didn’t believe in “the myth of global warming” and was skeptical of bureaucrats and politicians that had the ability to decide on energy’s future through legislation (hey man, coal activists are too, they agree on something!). At the end of the conversation, the point he wanted to drive home was that with America’s current energy demands, solar and wind can not provide enough energy (true). He sees them as prospects to subsidize coal energy, but never as a viable, main provider of energy.

But perhaps the most interesting claims were what the new carbon sequestration technology would mean for the future of coal. At the time, they were days away from beginning to bury carbon underground. They were the first plant in the country (and still one of the first in the world) to capture carbon before it’s emitted from a smoke stack, process it, and bury it 1.5 miles underneath the earth. In 2009, when I was first in their office, their goal was to capture 100,000 to 300,000 tons of carbon in the first year (to keep things in perspective they emit 6-8 million tons of carbon a year). That’s also what online literature published by the company suggests to this day. When I returned to their office in 2010 (more on that in an additional post), 9 months after they started the initiative, they had successfully captured 11,000 tons. Out of the 5 million plus tons emitted that year, 11,000 tons had been captured.

The company is proposing to extend the carbon capturing capibilities to eventually capture more than half of the output. The bill, $334 million, would be paid mostly by the companies’ consumers and federal grants. As far as unintentional metaphors go, the process of burying carbon miles below the earth’s surface accurately paints the picture. Instead of solving the carbon problem by implementing more sustainable practices, we bury it. Out of sight, out of mind.

Mountaineer continues to sequester carbon, although I’m not sure at what rate. After the meeting, J.L. took me on a tour. He was very accommodating, even jumping in some photos. The factory was neat and looked clean. However, everything had a thin layer of dust on its surface. Below are photos from my first trip to the plant in 2009. I hesitated to post these photos in 2009 because I knew I wanted to revisit the factory, and I was afraid they wouldn’t let me if they read about it on my blog. I’ll post another post in a couple days with the follow up trip in 2010.

A diagram Charlie drew that explained the US transmission system. He told me I couldn’t take a picture of it.

Inside a conference room.

View from on top of the incinerator.

Inside a viewing hole for the incinerator (the bright light in the middle is where the coal is being burned).

Brown Boveri.

Inside the control room.

Coal stock pile. This first visit was at the height of the recession, when people were consuming a lot less energy. Mountaineer had a massive stock pile that wasn’t being burned because of a lack of demand.