Opinion ID: 501787
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Unplain Meaning of Section 717(b)

Text: 321 The issue of whether underground mine operators are covered by the water damage provision arises because of the confusing terminology used by the drafters of the SMCRA. In some places in the statute, the phrase surface coal mining operation is used, e.g., Secs. 502(a)-(c), (e), (f), which the Act defines as: 322 (A) activities conducted on the surface of lands in connection with a surface coal mine or subject to the requirements of section 516 surface operations and surface impacts incident to an underground coal mine.... 323 SMCRA Sec. 701(28) (emphasis added). In other portions of the Act, reference is made to operators of surface coal mines, Sec. 502(d); Sec. 717(b), or to a surface coal mine operation, Sec. 717(b). These terms are not specifically defined. NWF suggests that the various terms are used more or less interchangeably. Industry and the Secretary, on the other hand, assert that the different phrases consciously distinguish between provisions applicable to both surface mines and underground mines with surface effects (surface coal mining operations), and those applicable only to surface mines (surface coal mine operation or operators of surface coal mines). 324 The Act clearly contemplates, at least for some purposes, that surface coal mines will be treated differently from underground coal mines, even though the latter have some surface effects. See e.g., SMCRA Sec. 516(d) (accommodating distinct differences between surface and underground coal mining). The most natural reading of the statute as a whole, and the definition in Sec. 701(28) in particular, then suggests that surface coal mining operations encompasses both surface coal mines and the surface effects of underground coal mines; but that the term surface coal mines, by contrast, does not include underground operations or their surface effects. 94 325 The history of the SMCRA confirms that Congress consciously distinguished between requirements applicable to surface mines and underground mines, and that water replacement was not specifically required by statute for operators of underground mines. Senate bill S.7 included a water replacement requirement in Sec. 415(b)(10)(E), a provision detailing the performance standards applicable to surface mines. The parallel provision for underground mines, Sec. 416(b)(9), omitted the water replacement requirement. See S.REP. NO. 128 at 25, 29. The Senate report demonstrates that Sec. 416 represented the Senate committee's judgment of which Sec. 415 surface mining requirements should also apply to underground mines. 326 Certain of the environmental protection standards for surface mining operations also apply to underground mines. In this section , the Secretary is required to incorporate in his regulations the following key provisions concerning the control of surface effects from underground mining. 327 S.REP. NO. 128 and 84 (emphasis added). 95 House bill H.R. 2 served as the main basis for the Conference Committee's final draft of the SMCRA. That bill contained the water replacement requirement in Sec. 717(b) in the form it exists today. The Conference Committee adopted the House language asserting there were no significant differences between the House and Senate versions with respect to Sec. 717. H.R.CONF.REP. NO. 493, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. 115 (1977), reprinted in 1977 U.S.CODE CONG. & ADMIN.NEWS 593, 746. 328 We conclude from the text as well as the legislative history of the water replacement provision, and from other provisions distinguishing between surface and underground mining, that Congress explicitly recognized the difference between surface and underground mines; that it deliberately chose to apply some environmental safeguards to one and not the other; and that water replacement is a provision it explicitly required only of surface mine operators. The Secretary's implementing regulations were reasonable and consistent with that legislative intent. 329