Judges: Coal project would destroy stream

Pennsylvania regulators acted contrary to state laws and the constitution when they permitted Consol Energy to “essentially destroy” and rebuild a stream above a longwall mine in Greene County, the five judges of Pennsylvania’s Environmental Hearing Board ruled Tuesday, even as they upheld another permit in the same coal mine.

In an opinion by Judge Steven C. Beckman, the board found the state Department of Environmental Protection was wrong to issue a permit for the Cecil-based company’s Bailey Mine expansion that predicted such severe impacts to Polen Run that a section of the stream would have to be replaced.

But the agency was correct in issuing a permit revision for other parts of the 3,000-acre mining project that caused more limited and temporary disturbances to streams, the board ruled.

“When the department anticipates that the impacts from longwall mining are going to be so extensive that the only way to ‘fix’ the anticipated damage to the stream is to essentially destroy the existing stream channel and streambanks and rebuild it from scratch, the department’s decision to issue [the permit revision] is unreasonable and contrary to the law,” Judge Beckman wrote.

The appeal was brought by two environmental groups, the Sierra Club and the Center for Coalfield Justice, who argued that predicted damage to streams from the