An agreement that would enable a coal company seeking bankruptcy protection to renew a state mine permit despite not meeting pre-existing state bonding requirements ignores the law, the organizer of a landowner group said, the Associated Press reported yesterday. The agreement falls short of enabling the state to secure the almost $200 million that would be needed to reclaim Alpha Natural Resources’ Eagle Butte mine near Gillette, said Shannon Anderson of the Powder River Basin Resource Council. Instead, the deal would give Wyoming priority access to $61 million in case either or both of the company’s two mines in Wyoming closed and needed to be reclaimed. The full sum of the company’s $411 million in required reclamation bonding for the two mines would be a lower creditor priority. Meanwhile, the state’s pre-existing bonding requirements would not prevent the company from getting a new mine permit, according to the agreement filed in bankruptcy court.
