The Top of Old Smokey Might be Gone

I'm worried that other countries are going to stop trading with us because our lax environmental enforcement - allowing, for example, hundreds of miles of streams to be destroyed to lower the price of energy - gives us an unfair advantage. Here's part of the house that Jack built:

Rule to Expand Mountaintop Coal Mining, by John M. Broder, NY Times: 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. ... The new rule would allow the practice to continue and expand...

The regulation is the culmination of six and a half years of work by the administration to make it easier for mining companies to dig more coal to meet growing energy demands and reduce dependence on foreign oil. ...

A spokesman for the National Mining Association, Luke Popovich, said that unless mine owners were allowed to dump mine waste in streams and valleys it would be impossible to operate in mountainous regions like West Virginia that hold some of the richest low-sulfur coal seams...

Environmental activists say the rule change will lead to accelerated pillage of vast tracts and the obliteration of hundreds of miles of streams in central Appalachia.

“This is a parting gift to the coal industry from this administration,” said Joe Lovett, executive director of the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment in Lewisburg, W.Va...

Mountaintop mining is the most common strip mining in central Appalachia, and the most destructive. Ridge tops are flattened with bulldozers and dynamite, clearing all vegetation and, at times, forcing residents to move. ...

Roughly half the coal in West Virginia is from mountaintop mining, which is generally cheaper, safer and more efficient than extraction from underground mines...

The rule ... is known as the stream buffer zone rule. First adopted in 1983, it forbids virtually all mining within 100 feet of a river or stream. ...

The Army Corps of Engineers, state mining authorities and local courts have read the rule liberally, allowing extensive mountaintop mining and dumping of debris in coal-rich regions of West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia.

From 1985 to 2001, 724 miles of streams were buried under mining waste, according to the environmental impact statement accompanying the new rule.

If current practices continue, another 724 river miles will be buried by 2018, the report says. ...

The early stages of the revision process were supported by J. Stephen Griles, a former industry lobbyist who was the deputy interior secretary from 2001 to 2004. Mr. Griles had been deputy director of the Office of Surface Mining in the Reagan administration and is knowledgeable about the issues and generally supports the industry.

In June, Mr. Griles was sentenced to 10 months in prison and three years’ probation for lying to a Senate committee about his ties to Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist at the heart of a corruption scandal who is now in prison. ...

Comments

[Trainwreck]

I wouldn't worry. After all, as sad as it is, have we stopped trading with China because their poor human rights record and workplace safety record gives them a comparative advantage?

Economies have a way of spiraling down to the lowest common denominator, not the highest.

[TheBaron]

Agreeing with Trainwreck here. If nobody is reducing their trade with China, despite their horrible environmental policies, let alone the other human issues, I think it will be the last reason for them to reduce trade with the U.S.

[btgraff]

Disgusting - especially when compared against some very poor 3rd World countires:

Ecuador wants mining reforms via assembly

(Adds analyst quote in 8th paragraph)
By Alonso Soto
QUITO, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Ecuador's President Rafael Correa
wants an upcoming special assembly on rewriting the
constitution to forbid open pit mining and to prevent drilling
in biologically rich areas, said the government's top candidate
for the body.
Alberto Acosta, Correa's pick to lead the campaign to win a
majority in the Sept. 30 vote for assembly seats, said reforms
are needed to protect the country's ecology from the nascent
mining industry.
"Ideally, I would prefer to stop all large-scale mining,"
Acosta, a former energy and mines minister who quit to run for
the assembly, told Reuters. "But at least by stopping open pit
mining, we can protect our natural wealth."
Acosta, who during his six-month stint in the ministry had
an aggressive stance against mining, said he would push for all
mining in Ecuador "to be be underground."
Deputy Mining Minister Jose Serrano in later comments said
the proposals for mining reforms are still under discussion. He
said the government was consulting with environmentalists,
communities and mining companies for a final package of
reforms.
"The president orders are to continue with the dialogue so
we can have reforms in which we all agree on," Serrano told
Reuters.
Serrano, who in July replaced an environmentalist in the
job, has started a review of concessions in the southern
province of Azuay amid calls from environmentalists and local
communities to cancel concessions.
"You have to take very seriously what Acosta says," said
Mark Turner, analyst with New York-based Hallgarten & Company.
"He is part of Correa's inner circle, and his opinion carries a
lot of weigh inside the government."
Correa, a former economy minister promising broad reforms
to curb traditional parties, has put his political future on
the line and vowed to quit if his supporters fail to clinch a
majority in the assembly to overhaul the constitution.
The leftist president's chances of securing a majority are
slim as experts warn that the proportional method for assigning
seats could lead to a fragmented 130-member assembly.
Acosta said he plans amendments to forbid any mining in
areas close to water sources and where local communities
prohibit extraction of precious metals.
"We will set a criteria to review mining concessions... and
take back some of them," Acosta said without giving any more
details. "We will also talk about introducing royalties."
Ecuador lacks significant production of precious metals,
but Canadian companies such as Corriente Resources
, Iamgold Corp and Aurelian Resources Resources
Inc are exploring for gold and copper.
Mining companies don't pay royalties to the government, but
instead an annual concession ownership fee.
Environmentalists and villagers have clashed with miners to
demand the government take back mining concessions they say
damage local communities.
((Editing by Christian Wiessner; alonso.soto@reuters.com;
Tel: 593-22523560 ext 102))
Keywords: ECUADOR MINING/ASSEMBLY


(C) Reuters 2007.

[Patricia Shannon]

Just what we need, more cheap coal to add to global warming. We don't need enemies to damage our country. Our own people are doing a fine job of that on their own.

[Ian Wilker]

Mountaintop removal mining truly sets my teeth on edge. Essentially, the mining company that practices it maximizing its profit in the very short term (there are other ways to get the coal out of the ground), at outrageous expense to everyone else. It destroys billion-year-old landscapes that have touristic value (and greater potential), and leaves surrounding communities -- generally very poor to begin with -- with land that has no economic value whatsoever. "Mitigation" is a joke.

The history of the rulemaking -- really, the whole exercise of Griles' appointment and tenure at Interior -- can't reasonably be explained as anything other than "run-of-the-mill graft and gross perversion of public purpose" as The Atlantic's Matthew Yglesias writes.

Heather Taylor's blog on NRDC's Switchboard site has a good piece on this latest news. Here are two background must-reads from OnEarth Magazine on the subject.

[anne]

Remember, also, we have not looked with any care to the issue of miner protections whether by union or by appropriate government agency. Mining is seemingly a hazardous employment as well as an environmental hazard worldwide, and needs careful regulation in several forms though I do not know enough to understand the forms.

[Peter Schaeffer]

Mr. Thoma,

A number of folks have wisely pointed out that China trades freely with the world in spite of China's far worse environmental practices...

Quite true.

However, what is wrong with giving American firms an unfair advantage? China's currency peg clearly gives Chinese firms an unfair advantage. However, virtually every economist defends it as "good for American consumers". Why shouldn't the rest of the world welcome America's environmental policies as "good for their consumers"?

Stated directly, if China's subsidies are supposedly so great for us, why aren't our subsidies good for the rest of the world?

A funny note. I once pointed this out (with respect to US corn exports to Mexico) on Brad De Long's blog and got banned. Must be a very sore subject.