By Lawrence Messina
The Associated Press

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- West Virginia Coal Association officials warned lawmakers Tuesday that federal regulators continue to stymie the state's mining industry, despite recent signs of eased scrutiny.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency dropped objections last month to one permit sought for Patriot Coal's proposed Hobet 45 surface mine in Lincoln County. EPA is also negotiating with Arch Coal to avoid revoking a permit for its Spruce No. 1 mountaintop removal mine in Logan County.

But association lobbyists told a special House committee that the ongoing "enhanced review" of 20 other permits threatens plans to open or expand mines that could extract 19 million tons of coal a year.

Coal Association President Bill Raney said the affected sites together hold 132 million tons of reserves.

"About 1,300 employees could be subject to some kind of action if these permits are not issued," Raney told the House Committee on Coal Mining Permits. "It's hanging up employment, it's hanging up production, it's hanging up revenues coming to the state of West Virginia. We can't get answers from the federal government."

Raney said the Obama administration's EPA differs both with its West Virginia counterpart and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over the state's water quality standards. That stance imperils the industry amid signs of economic rebound, he said.

The recession dampened demand for coal last year, and preliminary figures suggest a double-digit percentage decline in production when compared to 2008.

"We ought to be postured to provide the coal that the nation's going to need," Raney said.

Echoing Raney, association Vice President Jason Bostic called EPA's actions an "intent to rob the state of its sovereignty."

"You have the federal Environmental Protection Agency trying to take, I think, the role of the Department of Environmental Protection and this Legislature, in interpreting your water quality standards," Bostic said.

Bostic said EPA's permit objections boil down to concerns that waterways disturbed by mining apparently displace a species of mayfly, and so disrupts the local ecosystem.

"If you follow EPA's argument that you can't have a shift in the bug community, then you can't have development," Bostic told the committee.

The federal agency was not represented at the meeting, and a spokesperson could not immediately comment afterward. But a West Virginia Environmental Council lobbyist who did attend said some of the association's allegations appeared exaggerated.

"Our perspective is the Clean Water Act is very important, and for them to say this is all about a species of mayfly is a little bit disingenuous," said the lobbyist, Leslee McCarty. "There are lots of problems associated with the permits that are Clean Water Act issues, and the EPA is looking into it. They need to give EPA time to see what the Clean Water Act says."

McCarty welcomed the committee's plans not to rush its review, but rather to hear also from EPA and the engineer corps. She also cited comments from committee members during the meeting that seemed aimed at resolving the permit holdups through compromise.

"That sounded kind of reasonable," she said. "It's [the coal association's] job to say the sky is falling. They were allowed to get away with things under the previous administration that the current administration now wants to look at, and they're not happy with that."

EPA's scrutiny largely centers on mountaintop removal, a mining method that employs blasting to flatten ridgelines and huge machines to scoop out the exposed coal seams. What's left behind gets dumps into the valleys below, burying whatever waterways they contain.

This method accounted for one-fourth of the coal produced from West Virginia mining in 2008, the latest year for state figures, and close to two-thirds of the coal yielded from its surface mines. Bostic said that EPA has filed comments objecting to permits also related to underground mining, which provides a majority of the coal produced in the state each year.