THE NATION - News from June 11, 2009
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The Obama administration today will announce plans to tighten scrutiny of “mountaintop” coal mining, trying to reduce environmental damage from operations that shear off peaks and fill Appalachian valleys and streams with rock and waste, federal officials said.
The policy changes will not end the practice of mountaintop mining, also called mountaintop removal.
But administration officials said their aim was to curtail its worst impacts, including barren land and filled-in streams. Their plan would propose to end a fast-track approval process for new mining permits in Appalachia and would reassert federal oversight over state regulators.
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