The Kentucky Court of Appeals has overturned a previous ruling that restricts coal mining on Wilson Creek in Floyd County.

In 2006, residents of Wilson Creek asked the Energy and Environment Cabinet to declare the area unsuitable for mining. They cited concerns about water quality, flooding and the destruction of renewable resources. The cabinet rejected the petition, but placed certain restrictions on mining in the area. The restrictions included not allowing coal to be hauled on a narrow road in the community, as well as requiring the land to be reclaimed with trees after mining.

The decision was upheld by Franklin Circuit Court. But now the Court of Appeals has ruled that the cabinet can’t place restrictions unless the land is first declared unsuitable for certain types of mining.

Floyd County resident Beverly May spearheaded the original petition. She says she’s still hopeful.

“So it could turn out to be both a good thing for Wilson Creek and a good thing for future communities that want to pursue this if there’s more clarity in the process,” she said.

A cabinet spokesman says the agency is still reviewing the court’s decision.

The Environmental Protection Agency will update residents tonight on the efforts to develop new pollution limits for the Floyds Fork watershed. This is the third time since August the agency has come to Louisville to discuss the project.

Floyds Fork has been designated as “impaired,” which means its waterway can’t fulfill its designated functions. The state Division of Water has asked the EPA to help determine the maximum amount of pollution that can be discharged into the watershed without exceeding the state water quality standard.

At the meeting, the EPA will present a draft model of the watershed, and update stakeholders on the process.

The meeting is tonight at 7:00 at Eastern High School.

A new study out of Yale University offers evidence that coal mining isn’t directly to blame for Appalachia’s health problems—but it could play a part.

For years, researchers have tried to figure out why people in Appalachia contract diabetes, heart disease and various cancers at higher rates than most of the country. Several studies out of West Virginia University found links between some of those maladies and coal mining. The new study, from researchers at Yale’s School of Public Health, suggests the causes are more complicated.

The paper was funded by the National Mining Association, a coal industry group. But its lead author, Dr. Jonathan Borak, says the NMA had no control over how the study was performed.

“In fact they did not see the report, receive a copy of the report until it had actually been published,” he said.

The NMA was looking for research to counter several studies done by Michael Hendryx at WVU, who has found links between coal mining pollution and human health, including higher cancer rates and birth defects.

Borak included all the counties defined by the federal government as “Appalachia” in his study, a swatch which stretches from Mississippi to New York. He concluded that a variety of factors contribute to pockets of poor health and high mortality in the region, including geography, lack of access to health care and culture.

But Borak says that doesn’t mean coal mining doesn’t indirectly contribute to Appalachia’s health problems.

“I don’t think this gets anybody off the hook,” he said. “I just don’t think that the issue here has to do directly with pollution. I think it has to do with a very complicated set of socioeconomic, cultural, behavioral kinds of factors which have really disadvantaged some of these people.”

Borak says mining companies have a responsibility to help improve conditions in their workforce and communities.

“Bad health in those communities isn’t good for them,” he said. “It isn’t good for their productivity, it isn’t good for their money and it isn’t good for their reputations. And it shouldn’t be good for their souls, either, I guess.”

The study was published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Two Metro Council Members will be in southwest Louisville tonight for a community meeting. They’ll be talking about coal ash at Louisville Gas and Electric’s two Jefferson County power plants.

The meeting is sponsored by 12th District Councilman Rick Blackwell and 1st District Councilwoman Attica Woodson Scott. They’ve invited state lawmakers and the Sierra Club, as well as residents of southwest Louisville.

Those living near LG&E’s two coal plants—Mill Creek and Cane Run—have complained of coal ash leaving the open air landfills and contaminating their homes. Last year, LG&E was cited  by the Air Pollution Control District for violations of their permit at Cane Run, but residents say the problems have continued.

Attica Scott says the meeting is a chance for residents to get information about their options.

“What we want is for people to learn more about the Air Pollution Control District and how we can hold LG&E more accountable for the coal ash that’s landing on peoples’ homes and property and affecting people’s health,” she said.

Scott says LG&E officials have not been invited to the meeting.

The meeting is tonight at 7:00 at the Southwest Government Center, 7219 Dixie Highway.

The Environmental Protection’s Agency’s new air toxics rule is officially on the books.

The new rule, which will require power plants to drastically reduce emissions of heavy metals like mercury, arsenic, chromium and nickel, was published in the federal register today.

This starts the clock for compliance. No existing power plant will have to meet the standards until April 16, 2015. For facilities that need extra time, the EPA has indicated it will grant extensions up to 2017.

But it also starts the clock for lawsuits. Industry groups and many Congressional members have criticized the rules for placing too many burdensome regulations on industry. If they want to challenge the EPA’s authority to promulgate the rules in court, they have 60 days to file a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell blasted the regulations, and said he supports a resolution sponsored by Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe to nullify the rule.

“Don’t be mistaken, Kentucky is at the center of the Administration’s bulls eye and this rule takes direct aim at Kentucky’s thriving industries,” McConnell said in a press release. “At a time when many Kentucky families are already making tough financial decisions, we must rein in the Obama EPA and their continued assault on Kentucky jobs and their families.”

Even if Inhofe’s Resolution of Disapproval gains a simple majority in both the House and Senate, to overturn the rule it would still have to be signed by the president.

Environmental and health advocates have praised the rule for the effect it will have on human health and air quality. The state has approved Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky Utilities’ plan to comply with the rule. That plan—which includes shutting down several coal-fired plants—is scheduled to be fully implemented by 2016.

The Louisville Regional Airport Authority has unanimously approved the new Bowman Field Airport Layout Plan, which includes a new safety program. In order to comply with new Federal Aviation Administration rules, the authority may have to trim or remove trees on private property near the airport.

Authority Executive Director Skip Miller says there aren’t very many options.

“If we want to continue to operate the airport the way it’s been operated for the last 30 years and be able to accommodate instrument landing conditions for aircraft arriving and departing, we have to meet the new standards,” he said. “That’s not a choice.”

He said the authority could decide to cut operations at the field and not allow planes to land in adverse weather conditions, but the board is interested in maintaining the status quo. But at this point, no one is sure how many structures will be affected.

“We don’t know exactly how many trees or how many obstructions it will be,” Miller said. “That’s what we want to find out. We think it’s best for everybody concerned to know exactly what the impact will be. So we want to start that analysis.”

Homeowners in neighborhoods like Kingsley and Seneca Gardens are worried losing mature trees will lower property values and environmental benefits. The Authority’s plan includes funding to replace each of the removed trees with two smaller varieties, as well as additional money for landscaping.

The first step in the process is assembling a committee to hire consultants to complete a survey of the neighborhood. A neighborhood resident will be included in that process, Miller said. Tree removal could begin as early as next winter.

Environmental Protection Agency employees are continuing an effort today to test soil in the city’s Park Hill neighborhood. They want to determine if pesticides in the abandoned Black Leaf Chemical site have contaminated nearby yards.

Black Leaf Chemical was a pesticide-manufacturing facility that operated on a 29-acre site in Park Hill from 1930 to 1970. Up until at least the 1950s, it made pesticides like DDT and Dieldrin.

Now, federal and state regulators have evidence that pesticides and heavy metals migrated past the site’s perimeters into nearby alleys. They’re testing more than 50 nearby yards to find out if they’re contaminated, too.

Art Smith is an EPA On-Scene Coordinator based in Louisville. He says his team is looking for signs of pesticides, arsenic and lead in more than 50 nearby yards.

“The concern for contamination in people’s yards, the levels would be, they don’t have to be that high before they could be a concern for people being exposed on a regular basis over an extended period of time,” he said.

In a house off of St. Louis Avenue, environmental scientist Don Hunter digs into the yard with a hand auger.

“We don’t want to collect too much sample, too much depth, because if we do, any contamination that might be present in the first couple of inches is going to be diluted out by the uncontaminated soil,” he said.

He drops the soil into a glass baking dish and repeats the process in four different areas of the yard. Then it’s mixed up and distributed between two jars. That’s the soil that will go to the lab for testing.

Art Smith says the results won’t be in for six to eight weeks. If the federal government discovers enough evidence of pesticides or heavy metals on private property, it could mean entire yards will be excavated, then filled in with fresh dirt.

Several national business organizations are asking the White House to finalize controversial greenhouse gas regulations.

The groups—which include the American Sustainable Business Council, the Main Street Alliance, Ceres, the Small Business Majority and Environmental Entrepreneurs—sent a letter to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget yesterday. They represent small businesses, some of which deal with the environment, energy or sustainability.

The letter urges the OMB to allow the Environmental Protection Agency to promulgate the greenhouse gas rules. The OMB has been reviewing the draft rules for several months and they’re scheduled to be released soon.

“We understand the importance of certainty and clear market signals and believe a national standard will both clarify risks and opportunities for US businesses, while also leading to technological innovation and investment in the domestic clean energy market,” the letter said. “Derailing or delaying such standards leads to increased uncertainty and undermines the potential for capital investment and economic growth, weakening the opportunity presented to US businesses by the growing $243 billion global clean energy market.”

The new rules are expected to require new power plants, as well as plants undergoing major modifications to reduce the amounts of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide they emit. They’re opposed by many Congressional Republicans, including Kentucky Congressman Ed Whitfield, who sent a letter to the OMB earlier this month asking it to delay the rule.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that the EPA was able to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, if it determined the gases posed a risk to human health. The EPA reached that determination in 2009. Once the OMB approves the rule, it’s up to the EPA to finalize it. The agency has said it doesn’t expect to finalize the rule this year.

Environmental activists are urging state lawmakers to stop supporting mountaintop removal coal mining and throw their weight behind renewable energy legislation.

Today is “I Love Mountains Day” at the state capitol.  Hundreds showed up to support the Clean Energy Opportunity Act, which would mandate a certain percentage of energy in Kentucky come from renewable or efficient sources.

Recent studies have linked mountaintop removal to birth defects, cancer and other diseases. The activists held pinwheels to represent the more than 60,000 people in Appalachia who they say are estimated to have cancer due to strip mining. They left those pinwheels on the lawn of the Governor’s Mansion, in hopes of sending a message to Governor Steve Beshear.

The Louisville Metropolitan Sewer District will formally respond to a state audit this week.

In December, then-state auditor Crit Luallen released a comprehensive critique of MSD’s managerial and ethical issues. The agency was given 60 days to respond, and that deadline is Tuesday.

The agency is required to tell the state auditor’s office what steps it’s already taken to implement the audit’s recommendations.

Interim Executive Director Greg Heitzman says the board has already addressed several of the findings—like implementing an ethics policy. Heitzman has set out a 30, 60 and 90 day action plan to address the audit’s recommendations, but realizes some changes might take longer.

“My projection is that by January 1 of next year, I think that we’ll be able to sit back with our board, with our senior management team and be able to assure the public that all of the items in the audit have been addressed,” he said.

Heitzman says there are over 150 recommendations to address, but MSD isn’t required to follow the auditor’s advice.

“So what will happen is, we will address every audit finding but it will not necessarily mean that we take and put into action every recommendation of the audit,” he said.

Instead, MSD can use discretion to put a more appropriate practice in place.