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CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Wyoming officials considering a permit for a new coal mine heard testimony about how the mine could lower groundwater and cause the ground to settle. The testimony wrapped up Thursday. The Wyoming Environmental Quality Council now will take written comments from proponents and opponents before deciding on a permit in August. Lexington, Kentucky-based Ramaco wants to mine coal from the Brook Mine near Sheridan for industrial purposes. That could include making carbon fiber, a material used in car and airplane parts. It would be Wyoming's first major new coal mine in decades.

SOMERSET, Pa. - Coal has never been a dirty word around these parts. But even veteran miners can't remember holding a ribbon-cutting and a lavish grand opening for what amounts to a hole in the ground. That changes today. In a highly unusual move, Corsa Coal of Canonsburg, Pa., will fete its new Acosta Deep Mine, located 11 miles north of Somerset, with so much pomp and circumstance that even President Donald Trump was invited. "It's in the spotlight all right," says Corsa Senior Vice President Joseph Gallo, who's overseeing the mine's opening. "I don't quite understand it, but it...

The Trump administration moved one step closer Friday in the process to withdraw former President Barack Obama's Clean Power Plan climate regulations, according to the White House. The Environmental Protection Agency sent its draft proposal for changing the climate plan to the White House, where it will begin the final interagency review process to scrap the regulations, which are under a Supreme Court stay. The proposal went to the Office of Management and Budget a week after President Trump announced he would be withdrawing from the Paris climate change agreement. The Clean Power Plan represents the centerpiece of Obama's plan...

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said the coal industry has hired thousands of workers since President Trump’s election. “We’ve had almost 50,000 jobs created in the mining and coal sector alone. In fact, in the month of May, almost 7,000 jobs,” Pruitt told Fox News’ Chris Wallace on Sunday. “ {..snip..}

HIGHLIGHTS o Trump's shrill speech has cast a shadow on PM Modi's expected visit to US later this month. o Dates for the PM's trip have not been formally or officially announced yet. o The White House has penciled in June 26-27 for first meeting between Trump and Modi. WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump unloaded on India among other countries during an epic rant on Thursday while announcing American withdrawal from the Paris climate change accord . The shrill speech, replete with claims of American victimhood at the hands of the rest of the world, casts a chill on Prime...

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed after meeting French President Emmanuel Macron Saturday to go “above and beyond” the Paris Agreement on climate change, after the US said it would quit the deal. Speaking two days after US President Donald Trump announced plans to withdraw from the deal on curbing carbon emissions, Modi said it was “part of the world’s shared heritage” and that India would “continue working…above and beyond the Paris accord”. The agreement signed by 195 countries in the French capital in 2015 “can protect future generations and give new hope,” the Indian leader said. He avoided direct...

Look at it this way: At least President Donald Trump refrained from body slamming Montenegro Prime Minister Dusko Markovic at the NATO summit last week. Dusko was lucky. Trump, obviously irritated at being surrounded by a bunch of European freeloaders and deadbeats, pushed the Montenegro leader aside when Dusko appeared to have stepped in front of Trump at a photo op.

European countries and major corporations are pressuring President Donald Trump to remain in the Paris climate agreement despite his promises on the campaign trail to withdraw the United States from the Obama-era deal that never gained congressional approval.The Trump administration so far is sticking with being undecided—at least until Trump returns to the United States from his first foreign trip, where on Friday, he’s meeting with Group of Seven ally countries, which support the agreement.Back home, the pressure is growing from multinational corporations, even the energy sector, which have opposed stricter limitations on carbon.Exxon Mobil Corp., once run by Trump’s...

Full Title............................Exclusive — Sen. Joe Manchin: We Need to ‘Educate’ Gary Cohn ‘A Little Bit Better’ on Crucial Role of Coal..........................Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), a Democratic U.S. Senator from the heart of coal country in West Virginia, told Breitbart News exclusively that he was shocked and disappointed in White House National Economic Council director Gary Cohn’s anti-coal comments in Europe this week. Manchin said in the exclusive interview that he hopes that Cohn will allow him to “educate” him more on his uninformed anti-coal standpoint, and that he looks forward to a deeper conversation with the official from President Donald...

In general, you arrive in an open conflict situation in one of three ways. Someone unexpectedly comes after you, someone you were expecting to come after you does so or you decide to to go after someone yourself. The term conflict situation as used here covers all the sins; interpersonal strife, business rivalry, trade wars and plain old war, but the essential rules of them all are the same. In the first case, it’s a failure of perception on your part as to the aggressor’s true intentions and all that can be done is something along the lines of the...

White House National Economic Council director Gary Cohn, a former Goldman Sachs banking executive, has reopened the U.S. government’s war on coal in direct contravention of directions from President Donald Trump. “Coal doesn’t even make that much sense anymore as a feedstock,” Cohn said in Europe on Air Force One, while speaking for the White House to the press, the New York Times’ Brad Plumer noted. “Natural gas, which we have become an abundant producer, which we’re going to become a major exporter is, is such a cleaner fuel,” Cohn continued. Cohn’s comments against the coal industry come as he...

Four Democratic attorneys general sued the Trump administration for reversing a moratorium on issuing coal mining leases on federal lands. Three of the Democratic AGs — California, New York and Washington — come from states that do not produce coal. Only New Mexico AG Hector Balderas comes from a coal-producing state. All four Democratic AGs are part of the “Green 20” coalition of top state prosecutors working together to keep Obama administration environmental policies from being repealed and investigate “whether fossil fuel companies misled investors and the public on the impact of climate change on their businesses,” according to a...

Boulder - Remember that unsuccessful attempt in the legislature to toughen penalties for vandalizing oil and gas equipment? Child’s play. It turns out the author of a letter to the editor in Boulder’s Daily Camera that got a national media mention last week — for appearing to endorse outright violence against fracking operations — is the author of a pending statewide ballot issue to hike Colorado’s severance tax on oil and gas production. Reached by phone today, Andrew O’Connor, of Lafayette, unapologetically reiterated his hardline stance ... “I wouldn’t have a problem with a sniper shooting one of the workers”...

A coal-export terminal proposed in Washington state would increase cancer risks for some residents, make rail accidents more likely and add millions of metric tons of climate-changing greenhouse gas globally every year, according to an environmental study released Friday. Millennium Bulk Terminals-Longview wants to build the facility along the Columbia River near the city of Longview to handle up to 44 million tons of coal a year. Coal would arrive by train from Montana, Wyoming and other states to be stored and loaded on ships heading to energy-hungry markets in Asia. The yearslong fight over the deep-water port comes as...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that he wants a long-term fix for miners’ healthcare benefits in the next government funding bill, moving Congress closer to a deal on the issue. “I’m in favor of a permanent fix on miners’ healthcare. It’s my hope that that will be included in the final package,” McConnell told reporters Tuesday after meeting with the GOP caucus. The question of what to do about the government-backed healthcare benefits for coal miners has complicated congressional spending debates in the past.

Britain went a full day without using coal to generate electricity for the first time since the Industrial Revolution, the National Grid says. The energy provider said Friday's lack of coal usage was a "watershed" moment. Britain's longest continuous energy period without coal until now was 19 hours - first achieved last May, and again on Thursday. The government plans to phase out Britain's last plants by 2025 in order to cut carbon emissions. Friday is thought to be the first time the nation has not used coal to generate electricity since the world's first centralised public coal-fired generator opened...

Guest post by David Middleton THE 240MWE FACILITY IS THE LARGEST POST-COMBUSTION CARBON CAPTURE PROJECT IN THE WORLD WASHINGTON, D.C. — Secretary of Energy Rick Perry took part in a ribbon-cutting ceremony today to mark the opening of Petra Nova, the world’s largest post-combustion carbon capture project, which was completed on-schedule and on-budget. The large-scale demonstration project, located at the W.A. Parish power plant in Thompsons, Texas, is a joint venture between NRG Energy (NRG) and JX Nippon Oil & Gas Exploration Corporation (JX).“I commend all those who contributed to this major achievement,” said Secretary Perry. “While the Petra Nova...

Buried in an otherwise-humdrum jobs report was the jaw-dropping pronouncement by the Department of Labor that mining jobs in America were up by 11,000 in March. Since the low point in October 2016, and following years of painful layoffs in the mining industry, the mining sector has added 35,000 jobs. What a turnaround. Liberals have been saying that Donald Trump was lying to the American people when he said that he could bring coal jobs back. Well, so far, he has delivered on his promise. There's more good news for the coal industry. Earlier this month, Peabody Energy — America's...

Buried in an otherwise humdrum jobs report for March was the jaw-dropping pronouncement by the Labor Department that mining jobs in America were up by 11,000 in March. Since the low point in October 2016 and following years of painful layoffs in the mining industry, the mining sector has added 35,000 jobs. What a turnaround. ‎It comes at a time when liberals have been saying that Donald Trump has been lying to the American people when he has said that he can bring coal jobs back. Well, so far he has brought them back. There’s more good news for the...

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt told dozens of Pennsylvania coal miners Thursday that the “regulatory assault” on their industry is over, and that the environment can be protected without hurting business. “We’re going to do it the American way, grow jobs and show the rest of the world how it’s done,” Pruitt said before going on a mine tour about 50 miles south of Pittsburgh. “The regulatory assault is over,” he said, referring to tightened environmental and other regulatory standards on coal and other energy industries under former President Barack Obama. “We’re going to partner together with you.” Pruitt...