UPDATE: Obama Administration Moves to Undo Bush-Era Coal Rule
2009年4月28日 - 6:03AM
Dow Jones News
The Obama administration on Monday sought to reverse a
last-minute Bush administration rule that made it easier for
companies that mine for coal by shearing off mountaintops to dump
waste near rivers and streams.
The action is the latest blow to the industry, which defends
mountaintop mining as a safer, cheaper alternative to traditional
underground mining. Coal companies had supported the Bush-era rule,
which permits companies that blow off mountaintops to get at the
coal underneath to avoid maintaining a 100-foot buffer zone between
nearby waters if it isn't reasonably possible to do so.
"It is bad public policy," U.S. Interior Department Secretary
Ken Salazar said at a press conference to announce that he had
directed the Justice Department to ask a federal court in
Washington to throw out the rule and send it back to the Interior
Department.
The decision is likely to have the most effect on central
Appalachian surface-mining operations, which account for about 10%
of U.S. coal production, according to Energy Information
Administration data. West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin, who received a
call on Monday morning from Salazar, is already trying to gauge the
impact on the state's coffers and on future employment.
"The governor shared his concern about the potential effect it
could have," said Matt Turner, a spokesman for the governor. "A lot
of jobs in West Virginia and throughout Appalachia depend on
mining, and certainly our nation depends on coal as an energy
source."
The action comes one month after the Environmental Protection
Agency under the Obama administration announced that it would
scrutinize 150 to 200 mining permits because of concern about waste
dumped into rivers and streams. So far, the EPA has asked the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers to revoke at least one previously granted
permit, and to ensure more safeguards before signing off on a
handful of other permits.
"We've seen a real change in the EPA," Consol Energy Inc. (CNX)
Chief Executive Brett Harvey said in an earnings call last week.
"There's a lot of resistance to mountaintop mining."
-By Siobhan Hughes, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6654;
siobhan.hughes@dowjones.com