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Conservation Groups File Suit to Block Federal Coal Plan in Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming

Date
August 27, 2020
Contact
Jeremy Nichols, WildEarth Guardians, (303) 437-7663, jnichols@wildearthguardians.org
In This Release
Climate + Energy  
#KeepItInTheGround
GREAT FALLS, Mont. A coalition of conservation groups today sued the Trump administration to block a massive plan to open up the Powder River Basin of northeastern Wyoming and southeastern Montana to more coal mining in violation of a 2018 federal court order. 

“Under the banner of climate denial, the Trump administration is again selling out huge swaths of public lands to fossil fuels,” said Jeremy Nichols, Climate and Energy Program Director for WildEarth Guardians.  “With this latest lawsuit, we’re taking direct aim at this corrupt attempt to sacrifice our climate, health, and lands in a desperate attempt to bail out the dying coal industry.”

Filed in federal court in Great Falls, Montana, the suit challenges the Bureau of Land Management’s land management plans for eastern Montana’s Miles City Field Office and northeastern Wyoming’s Buffalo Field Office, which include 3.5 million acres of public lands and 15.4 million acres of federal minerals. The area encompasses the Powder River Basin, the largest coal producing region in the U.S.

Coal mined in the Powder River Basin contributes to 13% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, making it a root national contributor to global warming. For over a decade, WildEarth Guardians and other groups have worked to confront coal production in the Powder River Basin in order to curtail carbon pollution and protect the climate.

Today’s suit targets the Bureau’s legal failure to address the public health and climate consequences of more coal mining and more coal burning.

In 2018, a federal court held the agency illegally approved plans to open up the Buffalo and Miles City Field Offices to more fossil fuel extraction. The court held the Bureau failed to consider taking action to curtail coal mining in the region in order to protect air, land, water, wildlife, and climate. The Bureau ultimately responded by approving a new plan in 2020 that is virtually identical and continues to fail to comply with federal law.

“The Bureau of Land Management’s actions here are both telling and troubling,” said Shiloh Hernandez, attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center. “The bureau is unwilling to reexamine its reckless commitment to large scale fossil fuel development in the Powder River Basin, yet it is also unwilling to tell the public the full truth about the extent of premature death and disease caused by this development. The fact is, air pollution from coal causes thousands of premature deaths in the U.S. every year and sickens many more. The law requires the bureau to disclose this information prior to allowing extraction of billions of tons of coal and huge volumes of oil and gas.”

The Bureau’s latest plans for the Buffalo, Wyoming and Miles City, Montana field offices call for opening up nearly 50,000 acres of land in the Powder River Basin for federal coal mining. Despite declining demand for coal nationwide, the plans anticipate 6 billion tons of coal to be mined over 20 years.

The Western Environmental Law Center filed the suit on behalf of the Western Organization of Resource Councils, Montana Environmental Information Center, Powder River Basin Resource Council, Northern Plains Resource Council, the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, and WildEarth Guardians.

“The court ordered the bureau to align federal coal management with the reality of climate change and shrinking coal markets,” said Bob LeResche, a board member of both Powder River Basin Resource Council and WORC and a Powder River Basin landowner. “BLM has ignored that order. They must modify their coal management plan to operate in the broad public interest and reduce impacts to coal communities. Federal coal leasing needs to match real market demand, and minimize impacts to our air, land, water, and agriculture and other economic activity in our states.”

As a farmer, I know the impacts from climate change are not abstract, but completely real,” said Wade Sikorski, a Northern Plains Resource Council member and Baker, Montana farmer. “Our farm, and others nearby, were just devastated by the kind of freak weather event climate scientists have long warned about. A wall of thunderstorms ran across the county, destroying our spring wheat and lentil crops and badly damaging our corn and safflower fields. At the same time, smoke from wildfires in California and parts of Montana are clouding the skies. If we don’t begin implementing clean alternatives to coal, we are risking our food security and the viability of family farms across the country.”

“Apparently the Bureau of Land Management cares more about appeasing coal, oil, and gas companies than it does about protecting public lands for all,” stated Derf Johnson, the staff attorney for the Montana Environmental Information Center. “It’s clear that if this administration had its way, it would simply open the gates to industry and let them turn the land upside down, without a hard look at the environmental impacts. But that’s not what the law requires.” 

“At a time when our skies are full of smoke from out-of-control wildfires, the public deserves to know how much pollution will be produced by burning fossil fuels extracted from publicly owned land,” said Connie Wilbert, director of the Wyoming Chapter of the Sierra Club. “This is not the time for another rubber stamp for the fossil fuel industry – we need honesty and transparency from federal regulators.”

“The Trump administration has utterly failed to come clean about the dangers of coal mining,” said Michael Saul, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Ignoring the dire consequences of coal mining will come at a steep cost to public health, wildlife and our climate. Sadly, the BLM seems hellbent on turning Wyoming and Montana into sacrifice zones to benefit this industry.”

Coal produced in the Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming is burned in over 100 coal-fired power plants, fueling the climate crisis.

Other Contact
Angel Amaya, Western Organization of Resource Councils, aamaya@worc.org, 361-779-2572, Shiloh Hernandez, Western Environmental Law Center, 406-204-4861, hernandez@westernlaw.org, Bob LeResche, Powder River Basin Resource Council, 907-723-2506, Dustin Ogdin, Northern Plains Resource Council, dustin@northernplains.org, 406-850-6227, Derf Johnson, Montana Environmental Information Center, djohnson@meic.org, 406-581-4634, Connie Wilbert, Sierra Club, connie.wilbert@sierraclub.org, 307-460-8046, Michael Saul, Center for Biological Diversity, msaul@biologicaldiversity.org, 303-915-8308