Why produce coal ash in first place?

Are there any real beneficial uses to coal ash? Did we not go through this with asbestos? Would it be best not to produce coal ash in the first place?

We contaminate the air from every step in the coal use process. We’ve seen the investor benefits, with Duke never missing an opportunity for profit and their public resistance to change. They worried that the clean smokestacks law would cripple our energy economy. As profits continue, we know that is not the case.

Some worry that the new EPA rules will stifle our economy; it is just not true. We see that Duke has quietly, since 2005, reduced its dependence on coal for energy production from 55 percent to 38 percent, increased its scrubbing of emissions from 80 percent to 96 percent this year and reduced its production of coal ash by default.

We can end the production of coal ash in our lifetime, reduce emissions from coal and translate our profit structure in the energy sector to a more environmentally responsible one and create jobs producing clean energy, if we support the EPA plan to reduce our carbon emissions.

— Terry Lansdell

Charlotte

Men sing of glory

As you are making plans to celebrate Christmas, don’t neglect to put the Salisbury Men’s Chorus Concert Sing We Now of Christmas, on Sunday, Dec. 7 at 4 p.m. on top of your list.

The Advent concert is not performed by distant individuals paid to travel into town. These are faces of men you have met in our schools, local businesses, grocery stores and post offices. These are fathers supporting their kids’ teams in Little League, doctors who deliver babies, and retirees who give back to the community through volunteer work.

These are the tenors and baritones of real life who truly understand the hills and valleys of musical crescendos and decrescendos.

There is something infinitely special hearing the voices of men forged by the heroics of daily life, fueled by a passion to glorify God, and directed by the angelic Rosemary Kinard that kindles hearts to greater warmth and moves souls to richer compassion.

Skip the mall and visit St. John’s main sanctuary on Sunday for a Christmas event that will resound within you for many weeks. I can’t wait!

— Gerrie W. Blackwelder

Salisbury