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HB 4277 - giving DEP Secretary signature authority for water quality permits.
HB 4513 - Marcellus Shale "Water Bill".
Please take the time early Saturday to call or e-mail your Delegates and especially the Speaker of the House, Rick Thompson. Ask them to REFUSE to concur with the Senate versions of HB 4277 and HB 4513.
HB 4277 Background: Gives the DEP Secretary the authority to sign NPDES water quality permits.
This change clearly violates provisions of the federal Clean Water Act that require NPDES permits to be issued and signed by the head of the "Expert Agency" in charge of a states Water Pollution Control program.
The Secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection is a political appointee and NOT an expert in water quality protection. The legislature should REJECT this bill.
HB 4513 Background: This WAS a good start for regulating withdrawal of water for drilling and fracturing these Marcellus shale wells. The bill contained regulations requiring identification of the contents of frac fluids - and set up a system for tracking the disposal of those fluids.
However, changes to this bill made by the Senate removed critical language that would have protected streams from being "sucked dry" by Marcellus Shale well drilling operations.
In addition, the Senate amended SB 369 into this bill! SB 369 would change the definition of a "shallow well" so that it applies to vertical Marcellus Shale wells. This would essentially legalize stealing of gas from neighboring mineral owners.
This bill is also bad for surface owners because without well spacing, there can be more of these larger sites on the surface, with no limit on how close together they can be. The bill is also bad for the environment because it would result in more well sites, meaning more forest fragmentation, more soil erosion and stream sedimentation, and increased risks to groundwater.
The legislature should KILL THIS BILL !
- Call the capitol toll free: (877)-565-3447 - you can leave a voice mail message for your particular Delegate. It will go directly to their office.
- Visit the capitol website: http://www.legis.state.wv.us You can locate your Delegate easily, and leave your e-mail message for them. Fast way: plug in your zip-code in the lower right of the page; click on submit - (your particular representatives contact information will appear).
Remember when the fish in the Potomac got weird and the thought was, just maybe, it was pollution in the water? As Lincoln Walks at Midnight points out, DEP guy doesn't. Any body want to ask him what made Mad as a Hatter mad?
UPDATE: On Wednesday the WaPo article outlines the executive order to get the EPA involved in the health of the estuary. Seems that the governors had been setting 10 year goals, so if they were not met, they suffered no political consequences. It is sad that the Gov. Manchin's name is not mentioned in the article, and the 2010 goals set in 2000 are no where close to being met.
The new nitrogen goal is 68 million pounds per year higher than the old 2010 target. The new phosphorus milestone is 3.8 million pounds higher than what was projected for 2010.
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Some of us are in the Chesapeake Bay water shed and some are not. I think there is something more to this story. There are more ties to the Bay than just the Forks of the Potomac.
CHARLES TOWN - Environmentalists are applauding the veto of a bill that would have enabled existing sewage treatment plants to delay compliance with Chesapeake Bay discharge requirements.
"We're happy. We think it's wonderful," said John Christensen, a member of the West Virginia Environmental Council's lobbying team.
Berkeley County Planning Commission has thousands of outstanding approved building permits. The recent North Berkeley Waste Water Treatment Plant, USDA Rural Development funds used, was built with this future capacity need in mind. Existing homes along planned sewer lines were required to hook on to the new system. Waivers were given to small trailer parks, which makes you wonder where the faith in their private systems is rooted.
When you drive to Morgantown from Jefferson County you pass over the Eastern Continental Divide.
It's official: The first shot has been fired in the legislative battle to end the devastating practice of mountaintop removal mining in central Appalachia.
With the quickly growing and extraordinary nationwide support of over 115 co-sponsors, including 17 members of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the United States House of Representatives, US Rep. John Yarmuth from Kentucky's embattled state of coal joined US Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and Republican US Rep. Dave Reichert (R-WA) in reintroducing the Clean Water Protection Act today.
The Clean Water Protection Act was introduced originally to challenge the outrageous executive rule change by the Bush administration to redefine "fill material" in the Clean Water Act, which has since allowed coal companies to blast hundreds of mountains to bits, dump millions of tons of "excess spoil" into nearby valleys, and bury hundreds of miles of streams. An estimated 1,200 miles of waterways have been destroyed by this extreme mining process.
The end result: Toxic black waters and poisoned aquifers that have denied American citizens in the coalfields the basic right of a glass of clean water.
[snip]
"Congress meant for the Clean Water Act to protect our nation's water resources; the Administrative rule change endangers those resources," said Rep. Pallone, who is the heroic author of the legislation. "The dangerous precedent set by the Bush Administration's rule change undermines the Clean Water Act."
[snip]
As blasting continues to shatter peace and prosperity in the coalfields of West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee today, anti-mountaintop removal advocates also continue to make their appeal to President Barack Obama, who told a campaign rally in Lexington, Kentucky, on August 27th, 2007, "We're tearing up the Appalachian Mountains because of our dependence on fossil fuels."
So, the big question is: will the bill have enough support to finally make it to the floor and pass this year?
The country's fourth-largest coal producer, Massey Energy Co., has agreed to a $30 million settlement with the government over allegations that over seven years it routinely polluted hundreds of streams and waterways in West Virginia and Kentucky with sediment-filled waste water and coal slurry.
Under the agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency, Massey Energy, headquartered in Richmond, Va., will pay $20 million in civil penalties and invest an additional $10 million in pollution control improvements at its 44 mines and coal facilities in the two states and in Virginia, the EPA and Justice Department were announcing on Thursday.
The agreement settled a complaint filed by the EPA in May 2007 alleging that the company violated the federal Clean Water Act on at least 4,500 occasions between January 2000 and the end of 2006 by discharging mining waste and sediment - including hazardous metals - into hundreds of streams and waterways and failing to control spills of coal slurry during its mining operation.
Some of the waste water discharges were more than 10 times the amounts allowed by state permits, the EPA said.
[snip]
The maximum penalties facing the company for the thousands of violations and days when permits were exceeded could have been as high as $2.4 billion, according to the EPA.
The pollution "destroyed streams, destroyed fish habitat. There was definitely an environmental impact here," Granta Nakayama, the assistant EPA administrator for enforcement, said in an interview. "We thought it was very serious."
The $20 million civil penalty is the largest ever for violations of the Clean Water Act, said Nakayama. "This is a landmark settlement for the environment, and raises the bar for the mining industry."
As part of the agreement, Massey promises to invest $10 million to develop and implement new procedures and tracking systems to prevent waste water discharges and slurry spills, and allow third-party audits of its pollution prevention program. The company also agrees to set aside 200 acres of riverfront land in West Virginia for conservation and protection against future mining.
Ronald Tenpas, head of the Justice Department's environment and natural resources division, said the measures agreed to by the coal company "represent a significant step forward in the way that mining facilities currently address Clean Water Act compliance."
The new pollution prevention measures are expected to keep an estimated 380 million pounds of sediment and other pollutants from Massey's mining operation out of the three states' waters each year.
In summary, the settlement is $20 million in cash fines, $10 million in improvements in mine conditions they should have made long ago, plus a conservation easement on 200 acres of West Virginia riverfront property.
Southern West Virginia Mountain Top...Photo by Vivian Stockman - Sierra Club (Click Picture for Hi Res view)
According to an article today in the Louisville Courier Journal by the Associated Press the Sierra Club is attempting to join a Federal Lawsuit against Massey Energy...
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. -- The Sierra Club said yesterday it hopes to join a federal government lawsuit that accuses Massey Energy of thousands of Clean Water Act violations.
"Massey has both a legal and moral obligation to protect streams and drinking water supplies in the communities where it operates," said Ed Hopkins, director of the Sierra Club's Environmental Quality Program.
The organization seeks court approval to join three environmental groups already involved in the case.
Naturally Massey is stating that the claim of thousands of violations is exaggerated as they explained according to the article that they are trying to settle the case. The article can be read by clicking here.
The Sierra Club has good reasons to join the suit as they have stated in an story on their web site as follows...
Washington D.C. -- Last Friday, the Bush Administration handed a seemingly huge payoff to the coal industry, which has been hammered all summer on Wall Street by a recognition that the tide of public and regulatory opinion in state after state is turning against the dirty fuel: the Administration proposed new regulations which explicitly authorized coal companies to continue mountaintop removal mining, even though federal judges have found the practice illegal.
The Sierra Club is wanting to do all they can to insure that the Bush administration does not get the opportunity to settle the EPA lawsuit against Massey. The Sierra Club article by Carl Pope can be read here. The New York Times broke the story of the Bushies scam regulation in an article that can be read here. The story reads in part...
WASHINGTON, Aug. 22 — The Bush administration is set to issue a regulation on Friday that would enshrine the coal mining practice of mountaintop removal. The technique involves blasting off the tops of mountains and dumping the rubble into valleys and streams.
It has been used in Appalachian coal country for 20 years under a cloud of legal and regulatory confusion.
The new rule would allow the practice to continue and expand, providing only that mine operators minimize the debris and cause the least environmental harm, although those terms are not clearly defined and to some extent merely restate existing law.
We the people of West Virginia must protect our mountains, our valleys, and our streams from this despicable attempt by the Bush administration to protect Massey Energy and other coal companies. Lets get back to almost heaven West Virginia not almost level West Virginia.
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