Comment: The Change Dems are no different from the Bush's era! Still blowing up our Mountains and shipping it to China, a communist country!
08/18/2009
SustainableBusiness.com News
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a Clean Water Act permit last week for Consol Energy’s (NYSE: CNX) Peg Fork mountaintop removal coal mine in Mingo County, West Virginia. This controversial decision marks the first time during the Obama administration that the Army Corps approved a mine permit to which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had previously objected, opening the door for many new mountaintop removal coal mines in Appalachia.
The decision to allow this operation to proceed also demonstrates the Department of Interior's lack of will to enforce the clear mandates of a critical Surface Mining Act regulation, the Sierra Club said in a release.
"We are disappointed that the administration has approved a new mountaintop removal mine without making any commitment to adopt new regulations or policies that would end this destructive practice," said Ed Hopkins, Director of Sierra Club's Environmental Quality Program. "While we appreciate that the Obama administration is taking a harder look at mountaintop removal coal mining, unless that results in decisions that end the irreversible destruction of streams, the harder look isn’t going to do the job."
The Sierra Club said the permit would violate the Clean Water Act and the Surface Mining Act's buffer zone rule, which protects intermittent and perennial streams.
"The Department of Interior's continuing failure to force the mining industry to comply with the buffer zone rule is a reminder that it is business as usual at Interior," said Joe Lovett, of the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment. Lovett called for Secretary Ken Salazar to "reverse the Bush Administration's refusal to enforce the Surface Mining Act and to protect our irreplaceable streams."
Earlier this year, the EPA conducted a review of 48 applications then pending before the Army Corps for Clean Water Act permits to fill streams. At the end of its review, the EPA identified the Peg Fork mine and five other mines as projects of high concern, and instructed the Army Corps to not issue those permits.
Following the EPA’s review, the Army Corps revised Consol Energy's permit for this mountaintop removal mine and issued the permit on Friday, August 7. But the revised permit still fails to satisfy the requirements for permits issued under the Clean Water Act, according to Sierra Club.
The original permit application proposed mining over 800 acres of mountainous terrain and dumping mining waste into eight valley fills and over 3 miles of streams. The revised permit that received EPA approval still allows two valley fills immediately, with the potential for up to six additional valley fills if EPA is satisfied with the results of downstream water quality monitoring from the initial fills.
The Peg Fork permit decision comes just as the EPA begins the process of reviewing more than 80 applications for Clean Water Act permits for mountaintop removal mining under the coordinated review process announced by the Obama administration in June. Mining companies have already buried close to 2,000 miles of Appalachian streams beneath piles of toxic waste and debris. Entire communities have been permanently displaced by mines the size of Manhattan.
"The Obama administration needs to commit to ending the devastation caused to our communities by mountaintop removal. The time to make that commitment is now," said Judy Bonds of Coal River Mountain Watch. "We can not live through another generation of permits that will bury hundreds more miles of streams and blast apart our mountains."
"Science and the law are at odds with this permit decision," said Janet Keating of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition. "In my opinion, the Corps' decision to issue this and other permits boils down to political pressure from coal-friendly legislators."
"A big part of the problem is that the Obama administration is still operating under the failed and broken regulations adopted during the Bush administration," said Joan Mulhern of the environmental law firm Earthjustice. "The White House and the agencies can and should immediately initiate the process for changing those regulations and restoring the environmental protections that existed prior to 2001."
"This week, newly appointed Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works) Jo-Ellen Darcy begins to oversee the Army Corps’ permitting divisions, and she has the opportunity to take bold action on mountaintop removal coal mining," said Cindy Rank of the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy. "The Corps has shown an inexplicable eagerness to permit new mountaintop removal mining, but we hope that Assistant Secretary Darcy's leadership will mean more protections for the communities, streams and mountains of Appalachia."
http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/18728
Showing posts with label Clean Water Act. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Clean Water Act. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Court Allows Gold Mine to Dump Waste in Lake
Water quality hazard: Acid drains from rock near Lower Slate Lake at the Kensington Mine (photo: US Forest Service)Comment: Bush Jr?
Published on Tuesday, June 23, 2009 by the Anchorage Daily News (Alaska)
Published on Tuesday, June 23, 2009 by the Anchorage Daily News (Alaska)
Despite ruling, detractors say fight is far from over.
by Elizabeth Bluemink
The U.S. Supreme Court's Monday decision allowing a gold mine near Juneau to discharge its waste into a fish-bearing lake could be the final word in the long-running dispute.
Water quality hazard: Acid drains from rock near Lower Slate Lake at the Kensington Mine (photo: US Forest Service)But environmentalists hope that it is not.
Their lawsuit over the Kensington mine, 45 miles northwest of Juneau, fueled a bitter war between industry boosters and environmentalists in the state's capital.
Statewide, the suit cast a shadow over Alaska's mining industry, and in particular, the massive Pebble copper and gold prospect in Southwest Alaska.
On Monday, Kensington's supporters -- including the entire Alaska congressional delegation and Gov. Sarah Palin -- hailed the Supreme Court decision as a positive step for Juneau and the state.
Coeur Alaska Inc., operator of the Kensington mine, announced plans to begin producing gold in the last half of 2010.
But environmentalists say their fight is not over.
About 150 members of the U.S. House of Representatives are co-sponsoring legislation this year seeking to reverse the Bush administration policy that the Supreme Court relied on in its ruling Monday. Also, a coalition of environmental groups are pleading with the Obama administration to cancel the Bush policy.
"If the Obama administration does nothing, it has busted the door wide open for destructive mining practices in other places," said Tom Waldo, a Juneau environmental attorney who argued the case all the way up to the Supreme Court.
He said the ruling will allow any developer of a project -- from Pebble to a coal-fired power plant in the Midwest -- to get around federal water-quality standards by petitioning the U.S. Corps of Engineers to redefine its waste as fill material, Waldo said.
That allows for easier, cheaper disposal: when industrial waste is considered fill, it doesn't have to meet state water-quality standards at the point of discharge; however, the water downstream still must meet water-quality standards.
The environmental groups that filed the lawsuit are the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, the Juneau Chapter of the Sierra Club and the Haines-based Lynn Canal Conservation group.
PEBBLE IMPACT?
The companies developing the Pebble mine proposal said Monday they are not sure if the ruling will affect their project. That's because they have not finalized their development plans, said Mike Heatwole, spokesman for the Pebble Partnership.
The Pebble developers might not need to put their waste into a lake, said Tom Crafford, a large mine permit coordinator for the Alaska Department of Natural Resources.
In theory, Pebble's developers could divert streams, fill in existing ponds or wetlands with clean material and store rock waste on top of the filled-in area, he said.
Other mines in Alaska have done that, including the Pogo gold mine near Delta Junction and the Fort Knox gold mine near Fairbanks, according to Crafford and mining industry officials
For that reason, Steve Borell, who runs the Alaska Miners Association, doesn't see Monday's decision as establishing a precedent.
Mines have typically built their impoundments in valleys containing wetlands, ponds or streams, he said.
Waldo, the environmental attorney, responded that there's a major difference between putting waste into a natural water body and putting it in a man-made pond, as other mines have done.
"This was a test case," he said.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency has to have veto power over the Corps' fill permits, the Supreme Court pointed out in its ruling.
The EPA chose not to exercise its veto over the Kensington project.
A WAITING PERIOD
Despite the positive ruling, the Kensington project still has up to a year to go before it can start producing gold. The Supreme Court sent the case back to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has 30 days to revise its decision against the mine so that it conforms to Monday's ruling.
State regulators said Monday they expect at least 60 days to pass before construction can begin at the mine again, perhaps longer.
Regulators need to make sure Coeur has funding set aside to dismantle the mine eventually and to review the design for the dam that will hold back Kensington's tailings, Crafford said. The dam and at least one other component of the mine project have not been built yet. Also, construction workers recently excavated acid-generating rock near the lake that must be dealt with before the project can go forward, he said.
The underground mine would employ about 300 people during construction of the dam and about 200 when it begins operating, according to Coeur Alaska.
The mine would be the capital city's second largest private employer, on a payroll basis, according to the McDowell Group, a consulting firm in Juneau. The largest is the Greens Creek silver mine on Admiralty Island.
Kensington could produce 125,000 ounces of gold annually for 10 to 15 years, according to Coeur Alaska. That production level would be worth over $110 million a year at today's prices. The Pogo and Fort Knox gold mines in the Interior are much larger.
FUZZY LAW
In a 6-3 vote Monday, the Supreme Court said the nation's laws and regulations are aren't in agreement on how waste put into a water body should be regulated.
In light of that fuzziness, the court deferred to a 2002 Bush administration memo that attempted to iron out the differences in the law. The memo was later used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as the basis for redefining the tailings, or rock waste, from the Kensington mine as fill.
The Corps approved a permit allowing Coeur Alaska to put the tailings in Lower Slate Lake, even though it would kill the fish -- Dolly Varden and threespine stickleback. The permit required the company to restore the lake when the mine closes and restock it with fish. Otherwise, the company would have to forfeit its reclamation bond.
Monday's ruling clears the way for as much as 4.5 million tons of mine tailings -- a slurry of rock waste, water and trace contaminants left after gold is extracted from the ore -- to be deposited into the lake about three miles from the mine.
Obama administration officials wouldn't say Monday whether they agreed with the court's ruling.
"We are reviewing today's Supreme Court decision ... and its potential implications regarding EPA's authority to ensure effective environmental protection under the Clean Water Act," read a statement provided by the EPA, which initially opposed the mine's lake disposal plan.
Doug Garman, a Corps spokesman in Washington, D.C., said his agency had no comment on the court decision yet.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/06/23
The U.S. Supreme Court's Monday decision allowing a gold mine near Juneau to discharge its waste into a fish-bearing lake could be the final word in the long-running dispute.
Water quality hazard: Acid drains from rock near Lower Slate Lake at the Kensington Mine (photo: US Forest Service)But environmentalists hope that it is not.
Their lawsuit over the Kensington mine, 45 miles northwest of Juneau, fueled a bitter war between industry boosters and environmentalists in the state's capital.
Statewide, the suit cast a shadow over Alaska's mining industry, and in particular, the massive Pebble copper and gold prospect in Southwest Alaska.
On Monday, Kensington's supporters -- including the entire Alaska congressional delegation and Gov. Sarah Palin -- hailed the Supreme Court decision as a positive step for Juneau and the state.
Coeur Alaska Inc., operator of the Kensington mine, announced plans to begin producing gold in the last half of 2010.
But environmentalists say their fight is not over.
About 150 members of the U.S. House of Representatives are co-sponsoring legislation this year seeking to reverse the Bush administration policy that the Supreme Court relied on in its ruling Monday. Also, a coalition of environmental groups are pleading with the Obama administration to cancel the Bush policy.
"If the Obama administration does nothing, it has busted the door wide open for destructive mining practices in other places," said Tom Waldo, a Juneau environmental attorney who argued the case all the way up to the Supreme Court.
He said the ruling will allow any developer of a project -- from Pebble to a coal-fired power plant in the Midwest -- to get around federal water-quality standards by petitioning the U.S. Corps of Engineers to redefine its waste as fill material, Waldo said.
That allows for easier, cheaper disposal: when industrial waste is considered fill, it doesn't have to meet state water-quality standards at the point of discharge; however, the water downstream still must meet water-quality standards.
The environmental groups that filed the lawsuit are the Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, the Juneau Chapter of the Sierra Club and the Haines-based Lynn Canal Conservation group.
PEBBLE IMPACT?
The companies developing the Pebble mine proposal said Monday they are not sure if the ruling will affect their project. That's because they have not finalized their development plans, said Mike Heatwole, spokesman for the Pebble Partnership.
The Pebble developers might not need to put their waste into a lake, said Tom Crafford, a large mine permit coordinator for the Alaska Department of Natural Resources.
In theory, Pebble's developers could divert streams, fill in existing ponds or wetlands with clean material and store rock waste on top of the filled-in area, he said.
Other mines in Alaska have done that, including the Pogo gold mine near Delta Junction and the Fort Knox gold mine near Fairbanks, according to Crafford and mining industry officials
For that reason, Steve Borell, who runs the Alaska Miners Association, doesn't see Monday's decision as establishing a precedent.
Mines have typically built their impoundments in valleys containing wetlands, ponds or streams, he said.
Waldo, the environmental attorney, responded that there's a major difference between putting waste into a natural water body and putting it in a man-made pond, as other mines have done.
"This was a test case," he said.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency has to have veto power over the Corps' fill permits, the Supreme Court pointed out in its ruling.
The EPA chose not to exercise its veto over the Kensington project.
A WAITING PERIOD
Despite the positive ruling, the Kensington project still has up to a year to go before it can start producing gold. The Supreme Court sent the case back to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has 30 days to revise its decision against the mine so that it conforms to Monday's ruling.
State regulators said Monday they expect at least 60 days to pass before construction can begin at the mine again, perhaps longer.
Regulators need to make sure Coeur has funding set aside to dismantle the mine eventually and to review the design for the dam that will hold back Kensington's tailings, Crafford said. The dam and at least one other component of the mine project have not been built yet. Also, construction workers recently excavated acid-generating rock near the lake that must be dealt with before the project can go forward, he said.
The underground mine would employ about 300 people during construction of the dam and about 200 when it begins operating, according to Coeur Alaska.
The mine would be the capital city's second largest private employer, on a payroll basis, according to the McDowell Group, a consulting firm in Juneau. The largest is the Greens Creek silver mine on Admiralty Island.
Kensington could produce 125,000 ounces of gold annually for 10 to 15 years, according to Coeur Alaska. That production level would be worth over $110 million a year at today's prices. The Pogo and Fort Knox gold mines in the Interior are much larger.
FUZZY LAW
In a 6-3 vote Monday, the Supreme Court said the nation's laws and regulations are aren't in agreement on how waste put into a water body should be regulated.
In light of that fuzziness, the court deferred to a 2002 Bush administration memo that attempted to iron out the differences in the law. The memo was later used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as the basis for redefining the tailings, or rock waste, from the Kensington mine as fill.
The Corps approved a permit allowing Coeur Alaska to put the tailings in Lower Slate Lake, even though it would kill the fish -- Dolly Varden and threespine stickleback. The permit required the company to restore the lake when the mine closes and restock it with fish. Otherwise, the company would have to forfeit its reclamation bond.
Monday's ruling clears the way for as much as 4.5 million tons of mine tailings -- a slurry of rock waste, water and trace contaminants left after gold is extracted from the ore -- to be deposited into the lake about three miles from the mine.
Obama administration officials wouldn't say Monday whether they agreed with the court's ruling.
"We are reviewing today's Supreme Court decision ... and its potential implications regarding EPA's authority to ensure effective environmental protection under the Clean Water Act," read a statement provided by the EPA, which initially opposed the mine's lake disposal plan.
Doug Garman, a Corps spokesman in Washington, D.C., said his agency had no comment on the court decision yet.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/06/23
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