Coal mining in the Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming began in the 1920s, but it wasn’t until the energy crises of the 1970s that development of the region’s abundant reserves got seriously underway, and the region soared economically. I was at the time working at the Solar Energy Research Institute and simultaneously free-lancing energy stories for a number of print venues. I often traveled to chronicle the economic and social upheaval as well as the gawdawful environmental changes around energy boomtowns like Craig, Colorado, and Gillette, Wyoming.
In the 1990s, the low-sulfur coal of the basin was coveted because of the need to comply with Clean Air Act emission standards designed to curb acid rain caused by burning coal at electricity-generating power plants. By 2003, the Powder River Basin had ripped more coal from the ground than had been taken from the Appalachian basins of the eastern United States. Currently, the mines of the basin extract about 43% of total U.S. coal production and are the single largest U.S. source of carbon dioxide emissions. Of that haul of coal, 85% comes from leased federal land. But just as overall U.S. coal production peaked in 2008, it also did so in the basin as power companies switched to renewables or natural gas. Production has been on the decline ever since.
For more than a decade, climate activists have fought against new federal leases for fossil fuel operations, and the Bureau of Land Management previously generated land-use plans that would partially curtail the practice. But litigation knocked those down as inadequate.
On Thursday, to the expected howls of Republicans like body-slamming, illegal wolf-shooting Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte, President Joe Biden announced a proposed rule to end offering new coal leases on 13 million federally owned acres in the basin. This wouldn’t immediately end coal production there. Far from it. The Bureau of Land Management’s two land-use plans would let existing operations keep going for decades—until 2041 in Wyoming and 2060 in Montana. However, recently finalized Environmental Protection Agency rules mandating strict new emissions controls at power plants could shutter all of them by 2039 if the rules survive the lawsuits already filed. Since basin coal goes almost exclusively to generate electricity, that means future production would depend on exports abroad. These make up just 2% of current output.
A list of the 16 existing mines can be seen here. Public comments on the proposed rule will be open for 30 days.
The no-leasing proposal is a response to a 2022 court order saying proposed land-use plans under the Trump administration had failed to fully account for climate change and public health problems caused by burning coal.
“This is a really critical, and frankly long overdue step that BLM has taken,” said Melissa Hornbein, an attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center, which has long been involved in challenges to previous BLM land management plans. “The amount of savings in terms of sicknesses, premature birth, fetal brain damage, respiratory infections, and mortality is almost hard to quantify, but it’s really, really impactful,” she told Jake Bolster at Inside Climate News.
In a joint statement with Montana Sen. Steven Daines, Reps. Ryan Zinke, and Matt Rosendale, Gianforte said: “Every action taken by the Biden administration is driving up the cost of affordable energy and threatening the reliability of our electrical grid. Affordable power generated by coal keeps the lights on in Montana and fuels manufacturing across the country and world. Today’s announcement is nothing more than a gift to China and our adversaries and a slap in face to hardworking Montanans. Instead of prioritizing the ideological agenda of the far left, President Biden should prioritize the needs of American consumers and workers.”
Daines said, “Since Day One the Joe Biden administration has been on an anti-energy war path in an attempt to appease far-Left environmental groups.” House Natural Resources Chair Bruce Westerman—an Arkansas Republican known for rejecting climate science and with a lifetime report card score of 3% from the League of Conservation Voters—said the administration was “weaponizing federal agencies to advance their radical climate agenda.”
This GOP talking point targeting “far-left environmentalists,” “radical climate agenda,” “extremist Democrat (sic) green agenda” is a Republican favorite. Quite the accusation when considering the truly radical, extremist, and dead-end Republican agenda of throwing up obstacles to sabotage even modest efforts to mitigate or prevent the worst climate impacts.
A spokesperson for Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, who is in his toughest reelection contest since he entered the Senate in 2007, said in a statement to E&E News that he is reviewing the proposal. “Senator Tester will always stand up to President Biden’s energy policies when they don’t make sense for Montana. He is reviewing the proposal and encourages Montanans to make their voices heard during the public comment period.” If Tester does come out strongly against the proposed rule, it wouldn’t be the first time. He also opposed the recently announced EPA tailpipe rule.
Tim Sheehy, the Republican seeking to oust Tester from his Senate seat blasted BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning, a former Tester adviser. He tweeted: “BLM, run by former@JonTester advisor and eco-terrorist Tracy Stone-Manning, continues their war on American energy. We need to stand strong against the radical Biden-Tester climate cult agenda. Make American energy dominant again!”
The BLM has already published a rule to allow two new types of leases—for restoration and mitigation. This change had also caught the ire of the same Montana Republican leaders who blasted the end-of-leasing proposal.
Other people greeted the administration’s actions with praise.
Said Gillette, Wyoming, resident Lynne Huskinson, a retired coal miner and board member of the Powder River Basin Resource Council and Western Organization of Resource Councils: “As someone who lives near some of the largest coal mines in the nation, I’m thankful for the leadership from the BLM in finally addressing the long-standing negative impacts that federal coal leasing has had on the Powder River Basin. For decades, mining has affected public health, our local land, air, and water, and the global climate. We look forward to BLM working with state and local partners to ensure a just economic transition for the Powder River Basin as we move toward a clean energy future.”
Mark Fix, a Miles City rancher and member of the Northern Plains Resource Council, said: “Coal companies in this region already have decades of coal locked up in leasing, and it’s hard to imagine they’ll find buyers that far into the future given the competition from more affordable energy sources. This plan protects taxpayers from wasting publicly owned resources on lowball leases to subsidize an industry in decline. It’s time we take a clear-eyed look at the future and start investing in a transition away from coal.”
And Drew Caputo, vice president of litigation for lands, wildlife and oceans at Earthjustice, said: “This is a monumental decision that will save lives, safeguard our environment and significantly cut carbon emissions in the United States. For years, conservation groups have litigated to get to this point — arguing that the federal government cannot simply lease away our public lands to coal companies while ignoring the impacts to public health.”
—MB
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