Two South Carolina locations make this year’s list for Most Endangered Places in the South: the Great Pee Dee River and John’s Island.

The Southern Environment Law Center says these places are facing immediate, potentially irreversible threats today. Their list below illustrates the cultural, ecological, and scenic riches at stake now.

1. Clinch and Powell Rivers, Virginia – Issue: Construction of a new coal-fired power plant in Wise County will accelerate mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia, and further increase mercury levels in the Clinch and Powell rivers.
2. Interstate 81 Corridor, Virginia – Issue: Virginia officials are reexamining a plan to widen all 325 miles of I-81 to perhaps eight lanes to support long-haul truck traffic – a plan that would cost billions of dollars and cause tremendous harm to communities and historic, scenic, and environmental resources.
3. Marine Waters, Virginia – Issue: Virginia is the first state in our region to begin the process of opening up its marine waters to offshore drilling for oil and gas. The benefit of this short-term supply of energy is dramatically outweighed by the harm to the environment and communities.
4. Globe Forest, North Carolina – Issue: Destruction of rare, old-growth forest in the Southern Appalachians.
5. Pamlico River, North Carolina – Issue: The single largest destruction of wetlands in North Carolina’s history will occur if a phosphate mining company gets permission to expand its operations on the river’s banks.
6. Great Pee Dee River, South Carolina – Issue: Santee Cooper, a state-owned utility, is proposing to build more coal-fired power plants with outdated technology that would dump an additional 300 pounds of mercury into an already mercury-overloaded river.
7. Johns Island, South Carolina – Issue: A $420 million highway proposal threatens to bring large-scale development to this historic community, transforming the island into a sea of condos, mega-stores, and traffic.
8. Salt Marshes, Georgia – Issue: Large-scale development on biologically rich islands and tidal waters.
9. Weeks Bay, Alabama – Issue: Unchecked development and weak regulation threatens an area so unique it is one of only three in Alabama to receive the designation of Outstanding Natural Resource Water.
10. Cherokee National Forest, Northeast Tennessee – Issue: The U.S. Forest Service is moving forward with its plans to log several areas of this remarkable landscape, endangering trout, unbroken wildlife habitat and rare species.

I’m partial to Johns Island being on the list, especially since I was born 2 miles from the Angel Oak Tree right off Maybank Highway. With all the fuss about possible highway development coming on the island, people are up in arms over the change it will inevitably bring to the slow & easy way of doing things.