Tell federal regulators to make sure mines are cleaned up!

Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement

In Appalachia, our communities are deeply tied to our mountains — they give us clean water, refuge for wildlife and a sense of place. But today, hundreds of thousands of acres of modern surface mines are not being cleaned up. This puts nearby residents at risk, threatens our water and drags down our local economies.

Though federal law requires that coal companies reclaim their mines, the law requires strong enforcement by agencies in order to be effective. The federal Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement oversees all coal mines in the country as well as the state agencies implementing the requirements of the law. The agency just updated a rule to give more weight to community complaints about mine problems, but regulators should be doing more to ensure coal mine cleanup.

The law’s requirements for timely reclamation and a secure source of money to pay for it are poorly implemented and ineffectively enforced by regulators. Unreclaimed mines pose a danger to communities and the environment through water pollution, unstable ground, open mine portals and increased flooding risk.

For years, Appalachian Voices and our partners have been warning that coal companies are stalling reclamation and that bonding systems will not hold up to widespread bankruptcies. But OSMRE has done little to fix these pressing issues. It is critical that OSMRE act now!

The letter below presents three steps federal regulators should take, which would have immediate and lasting positive impacts on coal mine cleanup:


  1. Ensure bond providers will actually be able to provide funding for reclamation in the event that coal companies walk away from mine cleanup

  2. Require states to provide better data about mines in need of reclamation and make that data publicly available,

  3. Reinstate the guidance against allowing coal companies to self-bond,


Sign your name to the letter below to urge OSMRE to take these steps.

To: Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement
From: [Your Name]

Dear Principal Deputy Director Buccino,

As demand for coal continues to decline, weaknesses in the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act are becoming apparent and jeopardizing reclamation of modern-era mined land. A main purpose of SMCRA is to ensure mine cleanup. The Act accomplishes this through reclamation and bonding requirements. Enforcement of the law primarily relies on forward-focused punitive measures such as preventing coal companies from obtaining new permits or mining more coal. But now that few companies are mining coal or applying for new permits, there is little incentive for companies to comply. SMCRA was not designed to function as the entire industry winds down.

SMCRA’s reclamation bonding requirements were supposed to ensure that no mines would ever again be abandoned without funds available to the applicable government entity to complete reclamation. In practice, bonding programs have been poorly administered and are premised on the assumption that mine operator bankruptcies would be rare and isolated events. Many states have implemented bonding programs that are not sufficiently secure and have estimated bond amounts that may not cover actual reclamation liability. Alternative bonding systems, typically in the form of pool bonds, have insufficient funding to cover bond shortfalls in the event of widespread forfeitures.

Reclamation is not being completed in a timely manner. Coal companies choose to prioritize coal removal, leaving large areas unreclaimed. When companies go out of business, they leave a significant reclamation burden. In addition, SMCRA allows coal operators to put mines into temporary cessation. Coal companies usually cite “temporary market conditions” as the reason for idled status, even though it is now clear that poor market conditions for thermal coal are likely to be permanent. The result is functionally-abandoned unreclaimed mines that sit for years neither producing coal nor undergoing reclamation, making them more dangerous and more expensive for regulators to ultimately reclaim.

As bankruptcies continue, fewer companies are willing or able to take over mine permits. In many cases, companies are unable to find sureties willing to provide reclamation bonds. As third-party bonds become more difficult to obtain, states may reinstate the use of self bonds. Already, bankruptcies have contributed to an increase in permit abandonment, consolidation of many bonds under a small number of sureties, and an increase in surety reclamation.

Regulatory agencies are going to great lengths to avoid using the bond forfeiture system intended by SMCRA, and bankruptcy courts do not prioritize long-term community and environmental interests. Because reclamation burdens are so high, and available bond funds so inadequate, regulators have every incentive to paper over the problem and avoid forcing the issue. Bankruptcy courts allow permits to be transferred to disreputable companies that regulators have blocked from receiving new permits, or companies that clearly lack the resources to carry out the reclamation obligations they’ve assumed. OSMRE oversight is critically needed to address these issues and uphold the core purpose of SMCRA by ensuring that every mine site is fully reclaimed.

The lack of adequate bonds and the amount of mined land in need of reclamation are problems that have been building over decades. Unfortunately, there is no easy solution. However, there are several steps OSMRE could take in the next year that would help to assess the scope of the issue, keep problems from getting worse and begin to address stalled reclamation. We believe these actions are attainable, and could have lasting impacts beyond this administration.

1. Conduct a “stress test” for the largest coal surety providers and largest state-administered bond pools to ensure that those entities would be able to honor their bonds if large numbers of permits are forfeited;

2. Require states to provide quarterly or annual data regarding the amount of acreage that requires backfilling and regrading and the amount of acreage that requires revegetation for every SMCRA permit as well as the amount of coal produced from each SMCRA permit (already provided via OSM-1 form). Provide guidance on definition of acreage type so that data is comparable across states. Make this data publicly available and maintain availability of previous years' or quarters' data so that OSMRE and the public may easily understand trends in coal production and mine reclamation;

3. Immediately reinstate the August 15, 2016 Policy Advisory: Self-Bonding, which discourages states from allowing unreliable self-bonds.

Thank you,