EPA Follows Through On Veto of Spruce Mine Permit

As expected, EPA has announced it will veto the Spruce No 1 mountaintop mining permit, setting up an epic battle that could decide the future of large scale mountaintop mining in Appalachia.  Here is the final decision document, from Ken Ward's Coal Tattoo blog. From the National Mining Association:

In its latest attempt to regulate the U.S. mining industry out of business, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is attempting to unlawfully revoke a previously issued Clean Water Act Sec. 404 permit for a Logan County coal mine in West Virginia. The mine, known as, "Spruce No.1 Surface Mine" was issued its Sec. 404 permit in 2007 after a comprehensive 10- year review in which EPA fully participated and agreed with all provisions and findings of the permit. The mine has been operating for 3 years and represents 300 direct jobs in rural West Virginia and generates an additional 700 jobs in Southern West Virginia. Now, the unelected bureaucrats at the EPA are attempting to use their newly fabricated regulatory powers to attempt to revoke the previously issued permit and with it, reject the millions of dollars and hundreds of jobs that the mine continues to contribute to the community. We need to make sure this does not happen.
In the case of the Logan County permit, EPA's veto is likely to cost the state of West Virginia and Logan County millions of dollars in tax revenues and in a time of economic turmoil, the jobs of over 300 miners. But virtually every mine in the country at some point is required to obtain a Section 404 permit for its operations, so if the EPA is allowed to revoke these permits as they see fit, every mine in the country would be subject to unilateral, after-the-fact shut down of their mines at the hands of the EPA. This is a dire prospective for mining and communities that depend on mining. We need you to make your voice heard and urge your member of congress to oppose EPA's plans.

In Appalachia alone, more than 75,000 thousand jobs rely on mining operations that require section 404 permits. That number escalates nationally with more than 550,000 mining jobs requiring Section 404 permits across the country. And it's not just mining. Approximately $220 billion in economic activity need Section 404 permits every year.

Contacting your members of congress via our Action Center is easy and takes only a moment.

We need a strong show off support. The EPA needs to know that we will not let them regulate the mining industry out of business.