Tagged: coal

Kentucky environmental attorney Tom FitzGerald has turned down an award from the federal Office of Surface Mining.

FitzGerald--also the head of the Kentucky Resources Council--was to be the first-ever recipient of the ECHO Award, named for the agency's stated principles of Environment, Community, Humanity, and Ownership. The award was given out yesterday in recognition of the 35th anniversary of the passage of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act, or SMCRA.

Kentucky politicians have been lining up to praise a judge’s decision earlier this week to overturn the new way the Environmental Protection Agency has been eval

The coal industry and officials from numerous states, including Kentucky, claimed victory yesterday after a federal judge ruled the Environmental Protection Agency’s new guidance on water pollution near surface mines overstepped the agency’s authority. But the judge’s decision still doesn’t add certainty to the industry’s permitting process.

A new study compares the taxes Kentucky and neighboring states levy on natural resources, and recommends Kentucky set up a severance trust fund.

Nineteen miners died in the first half of 2012, according to the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration’s mid-year summary.

Ten of those deaths were in coal mines (the rest were in metal or nonmetal mines). And five of them were in Kentucky—four of them in coal mines, and one in a limestone mine.

According to the release from MSHA: