Letter to The Honorable Joseph G. Pizarchik, Director of the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement - Comment Period Extension For Sweeping Stream Buffer Zone Rule

Letter

Director Pizarchik:

We request the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE) provide a 120 day extension to the 60 day comment period for the recently proposed "Stream Protection Rule" ("proposed rule") that would drastically change the existing stream buffer zone regulations. The current 60 day comment period is insufficient for adequate review of and comment on the proposed rule, Draft Environmental Impact Statement, and Draft Regulatory Impact Analysis, which total approximately 2,500 pages of materials. Additional time is absolutely critical to ensure that affected states, stakeholders, and the public can reasonably analyze the complex impacts that will result from the proposed rule.

The background and complexity of the proposed rule raise many potential issues that justify an extended comment period. OSMRE took more than six years to research and draft the proposed rule based on "advances in science," but is allowing states and the public only 60 days to digest and comment on this complex proposal. Further, despite this long drafting process, state cooperating agencies have not received significant outreach, background, or data on the proposal since 2011, contrary to the process originally envisioned in the 2010 Cooperating Agency Memorandum of Understating with these states. In addition, the proposed rule is much broader than the existing stream buffer zone regulations and will affect every coal producing state--not just Appalachian states--while also changing hundreds of existing rules related to mining operations. Given this long closed door process in drafting the proposed rule, it is only fair for OSMRE to grant additional time--less than one tenth of the time OSMRE took coming up with the rule--to allow states and stakeholders to get up to speed and provide meaningful input.

The Stream Protection Rule will also have far ranging impacts on mining states, the economy, and ratepayers. These impacts will likely be augmented by the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) carbon dioxide emission rule for new and existing power plants that will significantly harm the coal production and generation industries. EPA has substantially modified these rules since OSMRE used them to analyze the proposed Stream Protection Rule's costs and impacts further complicating review of the proposed rule's effects. Fully analyzing the interplay between these regulations and their potentially devastating impact on the coal industry and economy as a whole will take far more than the allotted 60 days. OSMRE must allow for an adequate comment period of 180 days to ensure a full understanding of the proposed rule's cost and impacts before moving forward with these sweeping changes to the existing stream buffer regulations.

Thank you for consideration of this request.