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by One Citizen
West Virginia and the nation need jobs and coal. Nothing in the debate over mountaintop mining is going to change that in the short term. But, in the long term, as we mine and use a nonrenewable resource and as we develop alternative energy sources, the people that live in the steep, hostile terrain of southern West Virginia need a future, too. The opportunities created by surface mining will be gone if not taken advantage of now. We must have a base upon which to build our future and surface mining provides a key piece that base.
SOURCE: Randy Huffman
Title:
Cabinet Secretary of the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Subcommittee on Water and Wildlife
Hearing: The Impacts of Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining on Water Quality in Appalachia
The fact is that between 2000 and 2006, one company alone (Massey) managed to violate its clean water permits well over 4,500 times. Perhaps Mr. Huffman should list all the businesses he envisions which will want to locate where the water is so toxic that folks don't dare even touch it for fear of contracting cancer. And anyone can plainly see that the permits allowing "surface mining" are abused to the point where these companies are actually quarry mining, permanently laying waste to more than 1.5 million acres of hardwood forest and 1,200 miles of streams across Appalachia, a region that boasts the world's highest diversity of salamanders, crayfishes, and freshwater mussels in the world.
Fundamental to the original Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 (SMCRA) was the "approximate original contour" provisions, which specifically require surface mining operators to "...grade in order to restore the approximate original contour of the land with all highwalls, spoil piles, and depressions eliminated..." [Sec. 515(b)3].
In other words, under federal law, mine operators must generally put strip mine sites back the way they were prior to mining. The law calls this "approximate original contour," or AOC. In limited circumstances, operators that actually proposed post-mining development can leave mined sites flattened or with gently rolling hills.
Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) investigators found mine operators did not return the land to its original topography, or to the configuration spelled out in approved permit applications. Similar violations existed at both sites where AOC was required and where operators obtained variances allowing them to avoid that standard. source
"Variances"? I'm curious as to the exact circumstances and documented "post-mining developments" the agency decided to issue these "variances".
If Mr. Huffman is as concerned about the future of his fellow West Virginians as he's claimed, then before issuing any more permits to mine any coal whatsoever, his agency should require any and all offending companies to either restore the mountains to their original contours (according to strict SMCRA specs) and also clean up the hundreds of toxic waste dumps they've left across Appalachia in the form of coal sludge impoundments and slurry injection sites. If they refuse for any reason, then its time to jail those responsible until and unless they and/ or their companies pay to fix these problems.
If scofflaw companies want to try countersuing Huffman and the State of WV for letting them get by with offenses, then more power to them. I'm sure that our legal community could use an economic boost as well.
Now that's what I call a green jobs program, folks. |
