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In January, the Trump administration announced sweeping changes to the National Environmental Policy Act, one of the country's bedrock conservation laws. The comment period for the regulatory change ended yesterday, and many states voiced opposition to the rollback. Attorneys general from 18 states called on the administration to withdraw the proposal, emphasizing that "these changes grant extraordinary discretion to federal agencies and project proponents while limiting consideration of environmental and public health impacts from federal actions."
The rollback would limit the scope and timeline of the review process, which is used to assess the environmental and cultural impacts of government projects. The new rule "would trade reasoned and informed decision making for unjustified expedience," the attorneys general argue.
Taxpayers paid billions to clean up mines
A new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that over the past decade, taxpayers have paid $2 billion to clean up mining sites, and there are still nearly 600,000 sites on federal land that will cost billions more. Although mining companies are required to put up bonds intended to cover the reclamation costs, companies only paid $1 billion of the $3 billion spent over the past decade, leaving taxpayers to cover twice as much as polluters.
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This year, the data in New Mexico, for example, shows that oil and gas companies reported releasing three times as much methane as they did the year prior. All the while, technology is supposedly getting better as new systems are in place. But what we see is really unchecked releases of methane into the atmosphere…. In a place like the Four Corners region where you’ve already got levels of methane that are literally detectable from space, that’s a problem.”
