Judge taps brakes on Utah coal mine expansion, orders climate change analysis

Alton Coal Mine, on the doorstep of Bryce National Park, should never have happened. But the mine had reached the end of the coal reserves on private land, and applied to greatly expand the mine on federal land with a permit from the BLM. UPHE and several others groups sued to invalidate that permit. Yesterday, a judge ruled that in granting the permit the Trump BLM indeed did not consider the socio-economic costs of the greenhouse gases that would be produced by burning that coal, and that means a much more environmentally friendly Biden BLM will have to re-evaluate the permit. While the judge didn’t order the mining to stop, he did provide a legal avenue to eventually shutting down a mine that should never have been allowed in the first place. So we’ll give one thumb up to the judge and hope the Biden Administration withdraws the permit.

Read more here:
https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2021/03/27/judge-taps-brakes-utah/