Although oil prices have reached $100 per barrel, America remains addicted to oil. The U.S. consumes 20 million barrels a day — more than 25 percent of the world’s total.

How can we keep the engine of our economy humming as oil supplies dwindle away? Are ethanol or coal mining the answer? Ask award-winning investigative journalist Penny Loeb. She’s been writing about the consequences of America’s voracious energy needs for over ten years.

Loeb had a front-row seat when Trish Bragg took on the big coal industry in West Virginia and won. Bragg started out saving neighbors’ drinking water, then took her battle over mountaintop mining as far as Congress. Penny Loeb can recount both sides of this inspiring story that led to new coal mining regulations.

Loeb reveals:

•    Why America’s coal and oil supply are in serious jeopardy.

•    Hidden environmental costs of increasing U.S. coal and ethanol production.

•    Why Congress did not offer funding or tax credits for alternative energy in their recent Energy Bill.

•    Why ethanol plants are sprouting up overnight in depressed communities.

•    Positive steps individuals and corporations are taking to reduce energy use.

CREDENTIALS: Penny Loeb is a reporter and a former senior editor at U.S. News & World Report. She was also an investigative reporter for Newsday and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Loeb is the author of MOVING MOUNTAINS: How One Woman and Her Community Won Justice From Big Coal.

AVAILABILITY: Washington, DC, nationwide by arrangement and via telephone
CONTACT: Penny Loeb, (703) 470-8382 (VA); cfdodge@msn.com; www.movingmountains.info