Answering protests that Montana should reconsider its decision to lease Otter Creek coal, Gov. Brian Schweitzer demonstrated that he is willing to take the heat — literally. Most of the nation is cooking under record-high temperatures that scientists attribute to higher-than-ever levels of global warming pollution in the atmosphere. But the governor argues that Montana should profit by greatly expanding coal mining in the state, warming climate and the serious harm it will cause our nation and Montana be damned.
In 2010, the governor joined two other statewide officials on the Montana Land Board in voting to lease the state’s portion of 1.3 billion tons of coal in southeast Montana’s Otter Creek drainage to mining giant Arch Coal. Burning this coal would effectively double Montana’s present total carbon dioxide emissions for the next half century.
In Montana, we are already experiencing shorter winters, declining water supplies, drought and more frequent and intense wildfires because of a warming climate. Scientists estimate that glaciers will entirely disappear from Glacier National Park by 2020. Say Gone to the Sun National Park? Nevertheless, Gov. Schweitzer argues that somebody else will supply the world’s coal if Montana doesn’t. But if no country, state or polluter is willing to step up and be accountable for contributing to this global problem, then the worst-case climate scenario will become Montana’s — and the world’s — inevitable new reality.
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Adding insult to climate injury, the Land Board’s recent statements make clear that the fix is in regarding the Otter Creek development. The Land Board failed to evaluate the environmental impacts of a massive new coal strip mine before leasing Otter Creek, but claimed that it could change its mind down the road, even after the state had spent the $86 million that Arch paid it for the lease. But now, in response to last week’s protests in Helena against Otter Creek mining, Gov. Schweitzer was quoted by the Associated Press as saying “Is what they are asking me, is to give Arch Coal their $86 million back? … The Land Board has made its decision.”
The decision of whether to mine Otter Creek coal — and to unleash the resulting global-warming, air and water pollution, and other environmental impacts — was made when the lease was issued at the Land Board. That is when the state should have studied those impacts, and options to avoid them, in an environmental impact statement. But it didn’t. The Montana Environmental Information Center, Sierra Club, Northern Plains Resource Council and National Wildlife Federation now have appeals pending before the Montana Supreme Court to make this exact point: The time for the state to consider whether the damage caused by a massive new open-pit coal mine is too great to justify was before the decision was made to lease this Montana public resource to St. Louis-based Arch Coal. Not after.
We hope that the court will see — as the governor apparently can’t — that the time to make an informed and responsible decision regarding the future of our climate is now or never.
Jim Jensen is executive director of the Montana Environmental Information Center.
