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The U.S. Office of Surface Mining and Reclamation and Enforcement is accepting written comments on its proposal to place 67,000 acres in the North Cumberland Wildlife Management Area and the Emory River Tract Conservation Easement off-limits to surface mining.Written comments can be submitted by mail, hand-delivery or by courier to the agency’s Tennessee field office in Knoxville. The deadline for comment is Jan. 25.Public hearings on the proposal also are scheduled for Jan. 11 at Wartburg Central High School in Wartburg; Jan. 12 at Roane State Community College in Huntsville; Jan. 13 at the Clinton Community Center in Clinton; and Jan. 14 at Campbell County High School in Jacksboro.View the documents online: www.osmre.gov/TNLUM.shtm
WASHINGTON - It has taken five years, but the federal government is edging closer toward banning mountaintop coal mining in parts of the Cumberland Mountains.
The U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement released draft documents Thursday that, if approved, would designate portions of East Tennessee's mountain ridges as unsuitable for surface mining. No final decision has been made, but if the agency goes ahead with the proposal, the designation would in essence prohibit a controversial form of mining known as mountaintop removal.
The federal agency issued the draft proposals in response to a petition filed by then-Gov. Phil Bredesen in 2010, just three months before he left office. Bredesen, a Democrat, petitioned the federal government to declare more than 67,000 acres - a 600-foot buffer on either side of ridgetops - as unsuitable for surface mining.
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