The Environmental Protection
Agency took the unusual step
of revoking a permit Thursday
for the country's largest
surface mine, a setback for
the controversial practice of
"mountaintop removal" that
helps produce 10 percent of
the nation's coal.
The 2,300-acre operation at
the Mingo Logan Coal Co.'s
Spruce No. 1 coal mine in
West Virginia has been mired
in litigation since 1998.
The EPA's decision could
affect dozens of other mining
projects across Appalachia,
where firms have been
blasting the peaks off
mountains for years to reach
coal seams and then
depositing the remaining
rubble in surrounding valleys.
While the federal government
issued permits for hundreds of
these activities under the
Clinton and George W. Bush
administrations, the EPA
adopted new environmental
guidelines in April and is now
reviewing 33 other pending
permits.
The EPA's assistant
administrator for water, Peter
S. Silva, said the Spruce No. 1
coal mine, whose expansion
was scaled back from 3,113
acres to win a permit from the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
in 2007, "would use
destructive and unsustainable
mining practices that
jeopardize the health of
Appalachian communities and
clean water on which they
depend."
The mine would have
employed 250 workers and
produced about 44 million tons
of coal over 15 years, while
also burying more than seven
miles of streams. The EPA
used its authority under
Section 404 of the Clean
Water Act - which it has used
only 12 other times in its
history - to argue that the
subsequent valley fills would
harm the area's water quality,
habitat and wildlife.
Kim Link, a spokeswoman for
Mingo Logan parent company
Arch Coal, said the company is
"shocked and dismayed" at
the EPA's decision, which she
predicted "will have a chilling
effect on future U.S.
investment" in mining.
"Arch will continue to
vigorously defend the permit,
now in court, along with the
right to have a predictable
regulatory environment," Link
said in a statement. "Absent
court intervention, EPA's final
determination to veto the
Spruce permit blocks an
additional $250 million
investment and 250 well-
paying American jobs."
The 2007 permit is pending
before the U.S. District Court
for the Southern District of
West Virginia, which has held
off ruling on the permit. The
Justice Department asked for
a delay until the EPA made a
final decision on whether to
veto it. In the meantime, the
two sides agreed that the
company could conduct
limited mining with a couple
of dozen workers within the
watershed it had already
disturbed.
Joe Lovett, executive director
for the Appalachian Center
for the Economy and the
Environment, said the decision
reflects growing scientific
evidence that these projects
are eroding the region's
environment. Studies show
that when rainwater is filtered
through the jumbles of mining
rock it emerges imbued with
toxins, which in turn poisons
mountain streams.
"This is a road map for what
has to happen in this region
for these other mines as
well," said Lovett, who has
been fighting the Spruce mine
ever since a resident of West
Virginia's Pigeonroost Hollow
decided to challenge the
Corps of Engineers' permit a
dozen years ago. "Now EPA
has to step up and apply this
law and science to all these
other mines."
The EPA's new mining
guidelines bar operations that
would exceed pollution limits
of salt and specified toxins.
Since it adopted those
standards, it has given permits
to three surface mining
projects and has indicated it
will not block three others.
In the case of the Spruce
mine, the agency issued a
statement Wednesday saying
the company's proposed
practices "will lead to
unhealthy levels of salinity
and toxic levels of selenium
that turn fresh water into
salty water." It also noted that
after a year of negotiation,
"Mingo Logan did not offer
any new proposed mining
configurations in response" to
the agency's concerns.
Under the Clean Water Act,
the Corps of Engineers reviews
and approves the "dredge and
fill" permit that allows
mountaintop mining to
proceed, but the EPA has the
authority to intervene if it
determines the waste dumping
is too harmful or could be
averted. The EPA has used this
authority to veto one
previously approved permit,
for a Miami landfill in 1978.
Mining proponents, including
industry officials and Sen. John
D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.),
urged President Obama to
overturn the EPA's decision,
although it is unclear how the
White House could overrule
the agency's finding.
The National Mining
Association's president and
CEO, Hal Quinn, questioned
why "at a time of great
economic uncertainty" the
EPA would create yet another
obstacle to mining activity.
"NMA urges the
administration to step back
from this unwarranted action
and restore trust in the
sanctity of lawfully granted
and abided by permits and the
jobs and economic activity
they support," Quinn said.
Rockefeller predicted that
"this is a decision that has a
strong chance of being
overturned by the courts," but
environmentalists said they
were just as confident they
could prevail.
"The science completely
validates what we have been
saying for more than a
decade: These types of mining
operations are destroying our
streams and forests and
nearby residents' health, and
even driving entire
communities to extinction,"
said Janet Keating, executive
director of the Ohio Valley
Environmental Coalition. "This
type of coal mining is
destroying our cultural
heritage and our future. We
will continue our work to halt
other illegal permits, both in-
progress and pending."
Source: Http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/13/AR2011011307095.html
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