Environmental groups sued the Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation, and Enforcement (OSMRE) in Huntington, W. Va., federal court for failing to determine whether the state should overhaul its surface mines reclamation program in light of the insolvency of various in-state coal mines, Reuters reported. In a complaint filed on Monday, the plaintiffs including the Sierra Club say that OSMRE is violating the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) because it has failed to decide whether West Virginia should revise rules tied to the cleanup of abandoned mines through reclamation, even as state regulators have admitted that the state could be more than $100 million short to reclaim 100 private non-producing coal mines it may have to help clean up. The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) notified OSMRE in a December letter that "significant events" were impacting the implementation of its mine-reclamation program, the complaint says. The plaintiffs say the notice was the result of a prior lawsuit in which they accused WVDEP of failing to alert federal authorities it lacked funds to finish the current and anticipated cleanup of abandoned coal mines. The underfunding troubles came to light when WVDEP's head, Harold Ward, told a state court that mine operator ERP Environmental Fund Inc., which owns more than 100 in-state coal mines, appeared insolvent and therefore likely unable to complete the task of cleaning the mines up. Ward alerted the court to ERP's difficulties after his agency sued the company in March 2020, asking that it be put under the control of a third party. The West Virginia Business Court later that year appointed a special receiver who took custody of ERP's assets, shielding them from lawsuits by creditors. Under the SMCRA, West Virginia operates a state-financed fund to complete reclamation in the event a mine's operator fails to do so. WVDEP's head has said that reclaiming ERP's mines would overwhelm the fund, the complaint says.
