This post co-written by Mary Anne Hitt, deputy director of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign.
Very
big news out of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) this morning: The agency has determined that all 79 mountaintop-removal mining
permits submitted to it for review by the Army Corps of Engineers
would violate the Clean Water Act. After eight long years of rubber-stamp
permits being issued during the Bush administration, this is one of the
most dramatic and encouraging actions yet by the Obama administration,
and marks a welcome return of the rule of law to the coalfields of
Appalachia.
Mountaintop removal—a devastating form of coal mining that involves blowing up mountains and dumping the former mountaintops
into neighboring valleys, burying streams—is governed by a patchwork
of laws and federal agencies. Permits to bury streams with mining waste
are initially issued by the Army Corps of Engineers, but EPA has
ultimate oversight and may veto Corps-issued permits if they fail to
comply with the Clean Water Act.
During the Bush administration, EPA never opposed or challenged a
permit, despite the fact that they clearly violated laws on the books
to protect clean water and public health. Apparently, those days are
over. This dramatic announcement by EPA that every single one of the 79
pending permits violates the Clean Water Act is a condemnation of the
quality of permits being churned out during the Bush administration and
is a testament to the Obama administration’s sincere commitment to
science, transparency, and enforcing environmental safeguards.
All of these permits
had piled up behind a court decision that was issued in February, and
so most of them were written during the Bush administration. For those
eight years, permits were being issued that violated the Clean Water
Act, but EPA was prevented from objecting to the permits. Clearly there
is a new sheriff in town.
It is important to note that this is only the first step in this process. These mountains have not been saved. The Army Corps now has 60 days to
revise the permits and address EPA’s concerns. In our view, a sound
reading of the science would determine that these permits cannot be
issued. Some of the problems that are pervasive in all of these permits—heavy metal pollution downstream, the inability to restore healthy
functioning streams to replace what has been lost—are problems that
we just cannot engineer our way out of once a stream has been buried
under millions of tons of rubble.
And ultimately, the Obama administration needs to take the step of reversing Bush-era rule
changes that remain in place. Until President Obama fixes both the fill
rule, under the Clean Water Act, and the buffer zone rule, under the
Surface Mining Act, Appalachia will continue to suffer destruction
under Bush’s regulatory regime. You can encourage the Obama administration to take those actions here.
Today’s
announcement is just the latest stark reminder of the fact that, for
too long, the coal industry has benefited from loopholes that no other
industry enjoys. They bury streams with mining waste in violation of
the Clean Water Act. They still lack any federal regulations for
mercury pollution, a potent neurotoxin. They are allowed to dispose of
toxic waste from their power plants—coal ash—again, with no federal regulations. It is time to close these
loopholes, protect public health, and return the rule of law not just
to Appalachia, but to all of America.
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Comments
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skitters Posted 12:17 pm
11 Sep 2009
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neosapiens Posted 12:27 pm
11 Sep 2009
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Tyler Durden Posted 7:06 pm
12 Sep 2009
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randino Posted 12:31 pm
11 Sep 2009
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Tyler Durden Posted 7:13 pm
12 Sep 2009
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Tasermons Partner Posted 7:03 pm
11 Sep 2009
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Honeybeez Posted 2:03 pm
12 Sep 2009
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Rmoen Posted 2:05 pm
12 Sep 2009
-- Robert Moen, http://www.energyplanUSA.com
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Tyler Durden Posted 7:18 pm
12 Sep 2009
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