BLM plans to end future coal leasing in Powder River Basin

Friday, May 17, 2024

A coal mine in the Powder River Basin, BLM Wyoming

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has released draft resource management plans (RMPs) for two field offices in Wyoming and Montana. The plans would block any future coal lease sales across the Buffalo and Miles City field offices, while allowing existing coal mining to continue. The BLM estimates that federal coal mining in Wyoming would continue through 2041, and through 2060 at Montana’s Rosebud mine.

The revised management plans replace Trump-era plans that were struck down by the courts in 2022. The court ordered the Biden administration to take into account the effect of greenhouse gases and pollution from future coal production, and to consider alternatives that reduced or eliminated coal leasing.

"America’s energy future cannot include coal leasing," Center for Western Priorities Deputy Director Aaron Weiss said in a statement. "The only way to address the climate crisis is to transition to a renewable energy economy, and America’s public lands are at the center of that transition."

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                            Quote of the day
                        

As ranchers, we support the BLM Public Lands Rule and do so on behalf of our children and grandchildren, on behalf of a positive economic promise, and on behalf of all the natural wonders that our public lands provide.”

—Don Schreiber, Devil's Spring Ranch, Farmington Daily Times

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