New clash with Big Coal set as Obama proposes curbs on water pollution

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration on Thursday announced plans to strengthen protections for streams and rivers near coal mines, setting up a potential clash with an industry that is already fighting a proposal to limit air pollution from coal-burning.

The proposed Interior Department regulations would impose tougher standards for water quality around coal mines while requiring companies to take more responsibility for cleaning up waterways damaged by mine pollution or covered by mining spoils.

The proposals are the result of a highly contentious, years-long effort to update stream-protection rules enacted three decades ago by the department's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. Industry officials have strongly opposed the reforms, saying the new requirements, if finalized, would result in more layoffs and closed mines at a time when coal companies are under financial stress.

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, in announcing the proposals, said her department sought a "modern and balanced approach" that would allow energy development to continue while protecting water quality for people who live near coal operations, particularly so-called "mountaintop removal" mines and other surface mines.

"We are committed to working with coalfield communities as we support economic activity while minimizing the impact coal production has on the environment that our children and grandchildren will inherit," Jewell said.

Administration officials said the regulations would provide more regulatory certainty to coal companies by clarifying water-quality standards and allowable practices for coal mines. A fact sheet accompanying the proposal said the stricter standards would have "minimal impacts on the coal industry or electricity prices."

Among other provisions, the proposed regulations would require mining companies to collect water samples from nearby streams and rivers before and after mining and while operations are underway. Companies also would bear new burdens in ensuring that communities near mountaintop mines are protected from pollution, and damaged forests and waterways are made whole after mining is completed, administration officials said.

Mining industry officials blasted the proposal as costly and unnecessary.

"This is a rule in search of a problem," said Hal Quinn, president of the National Mining Association, a trade group. "It has nothing to do with new science and everything to do with an old and troubling agenda for separating more coal miners from their jobs."

But David J. Hayes, a former deputy Interior Secretary, said new regulations were overdue. "The current rules for mountaintop removal coal mining -- which are more than 30 years old - fail to protect local communities that count on healthy streams and clean drinking water supplies," said Hayes, a senior fellow with the Center for American Progress. Stricter bonding requirements in the proposed measures will ensure that taxpayers are not left footing the bill for environmental damage, he said.