Today the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WV DEP) published its draft listing of impaired streams that fail to meet state water quality standards and fail to meet their Clean Water Act (CWA) designated use.  Referred to as the 303(d) list, streams indentified on the list will ultimately require the development of a Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) to adjust pollutant loadings (and NPDES permit effluent limits) allowing them to achieve their designated use.  Attached is the “narrative” section of the new 303(d) list document.  The entire impaired water listing and supporting information can be found at http://www.dep.wv.gov/WWE/watershed/IR/Pages/303d_305b.aspx

The 303(d) list is open for public comment until June 11, 2012.  Since NPDES permits located on streams identified as impaired can ultimately be subject to NPDES permit effluent limitation reductions through the TMDL process, PLEASE review the list in detail and consider submitting comments / data to the agency on any stream listings that may impact your operations.

Additionally, based on a cursory review of the list, it appears that several streams previously removed have been RE-ADDED to the list for the same parameters.

The West Virginia Coal Hall of Fame inducted two new members, Charles Holland and Paul Morton, during ceremonies May 4 at the Stonewall Resort in Roanoke, WV as part of the 18^th Annual Joint Meeting of the Association and the West Virginia Coal Mining Institute.  Current WVCA Chairman Gary White with International Resources and James River Coal and past WVCA Board member Ben Statler were also selected to receive this honor but were unable to attend and will be inducted at next year’s Joint Meeting of the Association and Institutes.  Charles T. "Charlie" Holland and Paul Morton were inducted posthumously.

The Coal Hall of Fame was established by the West Virginia Coal Association, the West Virginia Coal Mining Institute and the West Virginia Mining and Reclamation Association in 1998. The Hall resides in the Mineral Resources Building of the Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources at West Virginia University, in Morgantown.

Show Your Support for Kentucky Coal

Save the Dates:  June 5 in Frankfort and June 7 in Pikeville

Background:

At the request of the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet, the United States EPA will conduct hearings in Frankfort on June 5 and in Pikeville on June 7, regarding EPA’s specific objections to 36 individual KPDES permits that would authorize discharges from new or expanded surface coal mining activities in eastern Kentucky.

A little more than one month is left before the end of the comment period on the EPA’s proposed GHG New Source Performance Standards Rule. The EPA published its proposed rule last month in the Federal Register, setting New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) for greenhouse gases. The 60-day comment period ends June 12. The public can view comment submissions at regulations.gov under the docket ID no. EPA-HQ-OAR-2011-0660.

Less than two weeks remain to submit stories and idea or reserve ad space in the upcoming annual West Virginia Coal Association/Friends of Coal State Journal insert.  If you would like to submit story ideas, photos or complete stories for the section, you can do so by contacting the Association at 304.342.4153 or emailing us at theadley@wvcoal.com. This year’s publication will be in glossy, magazine format with a projected page count of 48 pages.