Lawyers representing Utah Chapter of the Sierra Club, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, National Parks Conservation Association and Natural Resource Defense Council just concluded a 10-month litigation with Utah Department of Oil, Gas and Mining petitioning against the mine as it is currently proposed (which is approximately 635 acres of private land).  On Friday, June 11, 2010, we had our final hearing before the Utah Board of Oil, Gas, and Mining.  We raised five hydrology issues, and also addressed air quality, cultural resource issues and the impacts to the Panguitch National Historic District.  Two hydrology experts testified, and we were represented by one of the best attorneys in the country, Walt Morris, who has years of experience on coal mines, as well as several Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance Lawyers, including Steve Bloche and Tiffany Bartz.  

On August 3, 2010, the Utah Board of Oil, Gas, and Mining came out with a very disappointing interim order ruling against every issue raised by the Sierra Club, Natural Resources Defense Council, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, and the National Parks Conservation Association, effectively upholding Alton Coal Development's permit.  ACD, Kane County, and the Division of Oil, Gas, and Mining have until the end of August to respond to the interim order and then we have two weeks to respond to their response.  We expect the final order from the Board of Oil, Gas, and Mining in mid to late September. 

It is very important to keep in mind that Alton Coal Development has not received the necessary approvals from the Division of Air Quality or the US Army Corps of Engineers.  Regarding air quality, we have been told that in the next 1-4 weeks the Division of Air Quality will open a 30 day public comment period on the permit which will likely include a public hearing in Panguitch.  Regarding the Army Corps, we have been told that they are still doing internal reviews to be followed by a separate round of permitting.  In addition, ACD has not yet filed the required $6 million for a bond.   

***At this point, ACD does not have authorization to do any surface disturbing activities and it will likely be another few months (at the soonest) before that happens-it's unclear if this will be before the snow starts to fall.  We encourage people to be on the lookout for the air quality hearing and be prepared to mobilize turn out for that event.   We also encourage people to submit comments when the permit comes out.  We also suggest that people can pressure Governor Herbert to take action on the Division of Air Quality permit. 

The BLM is also working on an Environmental Impact Statement for a larger, approximately 3500-acre, portion of surrounding public land that is also proposed for coal mining.  The public will have an opportunity to comment on that.  The public also has the opportunity to comment on a draft permit from the Utah Division of Air Quality for the mine on private land.  That permit is not yet final and until it is final, no mining operations will proceed.  If you are interested in providing comments on either of these permits, we can let you know when they come out in draft form for public input. 

Hydrology Arguments Raised During Hearings:

The first hydrology argument we raised was related to the Cumulative Hydrologic Impact Assessment (CHIA) completed for the mine.  We argued that the CHIA was unlawfully deficient because it did not establish the criteria it was required to establish in order to monitor water quality.  The regulations require the coal mining company to prevent material damage to the water resources outside of the permit area and ACD did not show that it would do this. 

We also argued that ACD's water monitoring plans were incomplete because they did not include remedial measures and they failed to describe how the monitoring data that ACD collected will be used to determine the impacts from the mine to the hydrologic balance. 

For the third hydrology issue, we argued that ACD violated the Utah Coal Rules because it did not drill deeply enough below the permit area to identify the first aquifer below the coal seam that could be impacted by mining.  There was evidence that the first aquifer could be in the Dakota Formation which could be fractured and otherwise adversely impacted by the mining operations, but ACD did not conduct any investigation to determine whether there was an aquifer there that could be impacted.  For the fourth issue, we argued that ACD's hydrologic monitoring plans were unlawful because they did not establish monitoring stations on Lower Robinson Creek to accurately determine the impacts to the water there. 

Finally, we argued that the Division arbitrarily reversed previous decisions and violated the Utah Coal Rules by determining that Sink Valley was not an alluvial valley floor.