Environmental regulations to curtail mountaintop mining

[cali]

By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 2, 2010; A04

The Obama administration on Thursday imposed strict new environmental guidelines that are expected to sharply curtail "mountaintop" coal mining, a controversial practice that has enriched Appalachia's economy while rearranging its topography.

The announcement by the Environmental Protection Agency ended months of bureaucratic limbo on the issue. It was hailed by environmentalists but condemned by coal industry officials, who said it would render a technique that generates about 10 percent of U.S. coal largely impractical.

At "mountaintop removal" mines, which are unique to Appalachian states, miners blast the peaks off mountains to reach coal seams inside and then pile vast quantities of rubble in surrounding valleys. Under the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, hundreds of such sites received federal permits.

But on Thursday, EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said those "valley fills" will be curtailed. She cited new scientific evidence showing that when rainwater is filtered through the jumbles of
rock, it emerges imbued with toxins, poisoning small mountain streams.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/01/AR2010040102312_pf.html

[HillbillyBob]

1. horseshit

"a practice that has enriched Appalachia's economy while rearranging its topography" It does not enrich anyone but the mine owners, not the citizens or nearby towns it actually destroys.