Late last week, coal industry officials said they hoped that the 4th Circuit ruling ends the battle over valley fills. Let's get on with business. In October 1999, Chief U.S. District Judge Charles H. Haden II ruled that the buffer zone rule prohibited valley fills in perennial and intermittent streams. These fills are allowed only in smaller, ephemeral streams, the judge said. In mountaintop removal, explosives blast off entire hilltops to uncover layers of coal seams.
Huge shovels dig away the coal.
In July 1998, the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy and a group of coalfield residents filed a federal court lawsuit to try to curb mountaintop removal. Lawyers for the citizens alleged that the state DEP and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had illegally approved dozens of mountaintop removal permits. They said the permits did not require companies to protect streams and properly reclaim mined land. Most of the claims in the suit were settled. But lawyers could not resolve a dispute over a rule that requires 100-foot buffer zones between mining activities and streams.