The WV Coal Mining Institute, the WVCA and the Central Appalachian Section of SME will be held at the Stonewall Jackson Resort May 3-5, 2012. Registration information was sent out previously via e-mail with detailed information. If you did not receive please let us know and it will be resent.
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(Appeared in Daily Mail and other newspapers)
DC Federal Court Decision on Spruce is Critical First Step in Reining in Out-of-Control EPA
Decision confirms EPA has overstepped its authority and supports need for HR 2018
By Bill Raney, president
West Virginia Coal Association
There is no doubt about it, this past Friday’s decision in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia taking EPA to task for overstepping its authority with its veto of the Spruce Mine permit in Logan is a major victory for West Virginia’s 63,000 coal mining families and for the state as a whole. It is a critical first step in reining-in an increasingly radicalized, out-of-control agency, but it is only a first step.
In her decision, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Amy Berman Jackson left little doubt EPA’s action is a clear abrogation of the Congressional limits set for the agency in its relationship with other agencies, “‘EPA’s position is that 404(c) grants it plenary authority to unilaterally modify or revoke a permit that has been duly issued by the Corps… This is a stunning power for an agency to arrogate to itself when there is absolutely no mention of it in the statute,” Jackson wrote.
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Twice recently, the Supreme Court has curbed the EPA
By: Hoppy Kercheval
The Environmental Protection Agency, under President Obama's appointee, Lisa Jackson, has stretched its power to carry out an ideological mission.
Here's hoping a couple of surprising court decisions will temper the agency's zeal.
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Higher electricity prices will most affect those who can least afford them
By Matt Patterson
The Washington Times
“If someone wants to build a new coal-fired power plant they can, but it will bankrupt them because they will be charged a huge sum for all the greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.”
-Candidate Barack Obama, 2008.
Well, we can’t say we weren’t warned. This week, the unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats at the Environmental Protection Agency released a set of proposed rules designed to target greenhouse gas emissions. If enacted, these rules would virtually destroy the coal industry - just as President Obama once promised he would do.
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He really meant it when he said prices would "skyrocket"
By: Pete Du Pont
Our America today is very different from the America of some years ago. Government spending is greatly increased, as is the regulation of our economy. The growing size and reach of our government is sapping our nation's strength and independence. And our current president's policies have been quite different from our leaders of some years ago.
One of the best examples of these public policy changes is the huge increase in government regulation in how we generate and use energy, with its negative impact on supply, its focus on financing new and inefficient energy industries, and the resulting higher costs.
The policy of the Obama administration has been not to increase the energy supplies that are so critical to our nation's economic health, but to limit them, to increase energy prices, and to make energy more expensive.
Eliminating tax deductions for the oil and gas industries is at the top of the President's list, which would increase the price of gasoline and home heating oil for everyone. But this fits in with the Obama administration's overall inclination to hamper domestic production, whether through slowness in granting new permits or refusal to open new areas for exploration. In fact oil, production on federal lands was flat between 2009 to 2011, while production on nonfederal lands increased almost 7%.
And it is not just petroleum. Mr. Obama's Environmental Protection Agency wants to increase regulation of coal-fueled electricity plants, which produce almost half of our electricity, so as to drive up the price of electricity and force plants to close. None of this should be surprising, for as we know, Obama's energy secretary, Steven Chu, told The Wall Street Journal in 2008 that we must "figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe."
The president admitted that his cap-and-trade energy proposals, had they come to pass, would cause energy prices to "skyrocket" and bankrupt coal companies. In the Mr. Obama's words, coal fired plants can be built, but if they are, "it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum" for emitting the greenhouse gases.
On the other hand, the current administration is throwing money at "green" energy companies, exemplified by the failed $535 million federal loan guarantee in Solyndra. Alternative energy sources do need to be developed, but it is clear that the federal government is not a wise allocator of taxpayer dollars in this effort. These sources will never be developed to the point of affordability unless the free market is allowed to sort good technologies from bad without the skewing of investment that comes from government trying to pick winners and losers. America badly needs very different national energy policies that will increase our energy supplies, reduce the cost of energy, and get America positively moving again
http://online.wsj.com/article/