5/29/2003

Environmentalists dismayed by mining study

By MARTHA BRYSON HODEL
Associated Press Writer

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) -- Environmentalists who sued state and federal agencies over the regulation of large-scale strip mining in Appalachia were dismayed Thursday at the outcome of a lengthy government study.

After four years and $8 million worth of studies, four federal agencies on Thursday released a 5,000-page draft of an environmental impact statement that outlines three proposals for coordinating the regulation of strip mining.

"We would never have agreed to settle the case if we had known the extent to which the administration will go to have politics trump scientific reality,'' said Cindy Rank of Rock Cave. Rank is mining chairwoman for the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, which filed the 1998 federal lawsuit that led to the study.

Spokesmen for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Office of Surface Mining said it was important to balance environmental issues with the need for coal. More than half of the nation's electricity is generated with coal.

The agencies reported that 28.5 billion tons of high quality coal remains available in the 12-million acre area included in the study.

"This coal makes an important contribution to the energy needs of the economy -- 52 percent of American energy comes from coal,'' the agencies said in a news release.

Matt Crum, director of mining and reclamation for the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, said West Virginia has revised its mining regulatory program during the course of the four-year study, and so has few other changes to make.

A key part of the study has been to find a way to coordinate the work of the multiple agencies that have authority over strip mining. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, OSM and the corps all have authority over some aspects of strip mining.

"It's a lot more than learning to work together,'' said Mike Robinson of the OSM. "The overall framework is figuring out who takes the first bite at permitting under our different laws,'' he said.

One subject much debated is an issue known as "mitigation,'' which has been interpreted in various ways over the years since the 1977 Surface Mining and Reclamation Act took effect.

Under one set of rules, a valley fill -- the process by which leftover rock and dirt is deposited into nearby stream beds -- must be mitigated by improving another stream elsewhere.

"The corps already requires that an operator demonstrate that he can't avoid putting a fill in a stream,'' said Mark Sudol of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

"Once you demonstrate that you have no other way to get the coal out of the ground than by building fills, then you have to perform some mitigation to offset the aquatic functions that are cut off by the fill,'' Sudol said.

"Mitigation provides an opportunity to go and clean up a stream somewhere else, even though they're filling the headwaters of a stream where they're mining,'' he said.

The lengthy statement did little to placate environmentalists who oppose the mining method.

"The Bush administration is determined to remove any obstacles to maximizing profit for an outlaw coal industry,'' said Teri Blanton of the citizens group Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, a group which also has filed a lawsuit challenging mountaintop removal mining.

5/29/2003

Mountaintop Removal Study Criticized

Staff
Charleston

Environmental activists are livid over the draft environmental impact statement conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on mountaintop mining.

The study was required as part of the 1998 settlement of a lawsuit that challenged the controversial mining technique.

The study, unveiled by the Corps and other federal agencies Thursday, recommends actions to enhance protections of Appalachian streams from the effects associated with the coal extraction methods. Critics says the recommendations do just the opposite.

Joe Lovett is executive director of the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment. He says the federal study on the issue finds the impact is worse on the environment than was known when the suit was settled. He says however, the recommendations don't fit the findings.

"We anticipated those studies would show harm...and they did. They showed harm in a much more tangible way than we knew before," said Lovett. "But what's remarkable is those studies were actually used to loosen the rein on mountaintop removal mining rather than tighten them."

The study eases restrictions on size of valley fills to qualify for nationwide permits rather than site specific permitting. Lovett says it also requires little if any environmental analysis prior to the launching of mining activity.

"The Corps has used its science here to undermine protections that the mountains, streams and people of West Virginia should expect," said Lovett.

The environmental movement says the lax restrictions they find in the draft are squarely payback by the Bush Administration for monetary support in the 2000 election campaign. Bush campaigned extensively in West Virginia and received widespread support from the coal industry.

"The Bush Administration has worked the EIS into a green light for the coal industry to have its way with southern West Virginia and eastern Kentucky."

Julia Bonds of Whitesville adds the study reveals what coalfield residents have known all along.

"Mountaintop removal and valley fill mining is socially evil and environmental insanity."