Interior Department official met with coal industry lobbyists before canceling study on health effects of surface mining in Appalachia

A top official in the Department of the Interior met repeatedly with coal-industry lobbyists shortly before canceling a study on the public health effects of surface mining, Jimmy Tobias reports for the Pacific Standard.

Katharine MacGregor

Katharine MacGregor, the principal deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management, oversees the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. OSM hired the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine to do the study, but Interior abruptly suspended it last August, as researchers were about to hold their final public meetings on it. The meetings were held, and researchers said they expected to continue after a budget review that Interior had cited as the reason for the suspension, but then Ken Ward Jr. of the Charleston Gazette-Mail revealed that the study was the only one suspended. Later, the contract was canceled and the research committee disbanded.

Tobias writes: "Emails obtained through a FOIA request show that Katharine MacGregor had a hand in ensuring the health study's cancellation. Indeed, she appears to have been keenly interested in the matter." She wrote the OSM director Aug. 17: I thought you told me on the phone that this was postponed?" The next day, OSM suspended the work.

“This is the very essence of what we mean when we describe Appalachia as a sacrifice zone,” said Bob Kincaid, president of Coal River Mountain Watch, a group fighting mountaintop-removal mining. Bo Webb, coordinator of the Appalachian Community Health Emergency campaign, which helped prompt West Virginia officials to ask for the study, said in the same press release, "It’s clear now that canceling this study was a gift to the coal industry.."

Tobias reports that "in the months leading up to the cancellation," MacGregor's calendar "shows that she had no fewer than six meetings with the most powerful mining players in the country. In both April and May of 2017, she met with the National Mining Association. In March and June, meanwhile, she met with Arch Coal, a long-time practitioner of mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia."

The evidence is circumstantial, but Tobias sees a broader trend in MacGregor's calendars: "At the same time she held a mere handful of meetings—fewer than 10, according to my tally—with conservation organizations like The Wilderness Society and Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters." The calendar sshow that she "appears to have a habit of meeting repeatedly with industries and organizations that later receive favorable treatment from agencies she helps oversee," Tobias writes. An Interior spokesperson told him MacGregor is "happy to make time to meet with whomever requests a meeting," including conservation groups. "We have always welcomed input from all citizens and will continue to listen to ideas and concerns from anyone interested in sharing them."

National Academies of Science say study of surface mining's link to health is only one Interior has suspended, refuting department

When the Interior Department suspended a National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine study on the possible health effects of large-scale surface coal mining in Central Appalachia, it said it was part of a review of all grants and partnerships costing more than $100,000. But the study "is the only one of eight current Interior-funded National Academies projects that has been put on even a temporary hold, according to Academies officials," Ken Ward Jr. reports for the Charleston Gazette-Mail.

"Seven other projects with funding of $100,000 or more are continuing without any such orders from the department or anyone else in the Trump administration," Ward reports. "The mountaintop-removal study, with a $1 million price tag, is the largest of the studies. The total Interior funding for the other seven is roughly $2.8 million, according to National Academies officials," who are part of a "private, non-profit institutions that provide independent, objective analysis and advice to the nation to solve complex problems and inform public policy decisions related to science, technology, and medicine," Ward notes.

Steve Gardner

The scientific journal Nature objected to the suspension of the study, calling it a rare event and noting that little research has been done in the area, partly due to opposition from the coal industry. "Among the coal industry critics of the research was J. Steven Gardner, a Kentucky mining engineer identified by Environment & Energy News as the front-runner" for director of the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, which contracted for the study, Ward notes. Citing "multiple sources," reporter Dylan Brown wrote, "Gardner's name has been in the rumor mill since shortly after Election Day."

Gardner "was part of a multi-company team hired to analyze the potential economic impacts of the Stream Protection Rule, the Obama administration's seven-year quest to impose new restrictions on coal-mining pollution," Brown notes. "Gardner testified before Congress that he and other team members refused to change their assumptions for calculating the rule's impact under pressure from OSMRE and were subsequently fired. OSMRE, for its part, argued that work by Gardner and his colleagues was shoddy and both sides parted ways after not renewing their contract."

Study on strip mining and health suspended, but all sides were heard at meetings already scheduled in Hazard and Lexington

Historical map shows mountaintop-removal sites in red, other
strip mines in yellow. (For a larger version, click on the image.)

By Melissa Patrick
Kentucky Health News

A study of possible health risks of living near big strip mines in Central Appalachia held what may have been its final public meetings in Kentucky last week, following suspension of the study by the Trump administration.

On Aug. 18, the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement told the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine to stop all work on the study, citing a budget review of the Interior Department, OSMRE's parent agency.

"The National Academies believes this is an important study and we stand ready to resume it as soon as the Department of the Interior review is completed," the academies said in a statement, but the spokeswoman for the agency said they didn't know when that might be.

The academies created an 11-member committee to review the available research on the health effects of mountaintop removal and other forms of surface coal mining, and identify gaps in the research for study.

A number of studies have shown that surface mining is associated with higher rates of cancer, heart disease, birth defects and other health conditions in Central Appalachia, but have not established a connection, and other studies have been inconclusive or not even found correlation.

Hazard and Lexington meetings

The committee's first Kentucky meeting, Aug. 21 in Hazard, included coal-mine visits and a public meeting. The second was Aug. 22 in Lexington, where the panel heard from Kentucky environmental officials, geologists and others.

Several who spoke at Hazard said they hoped the Trump administration would restart the study and also expressed concerns that "mountaintop mining hurts air and water quality, impairs human health and destroys mountains and streams," Bill Estep of the Lexington Herald-Leader reports.

"Science isn’t going to hurt us. What we don’t know very well could," said Dee Davis of Whitesburg, president of the Center for Rural Strategies.

Coal-industry representatives said "Coal companies do a good job of reclaiming land and monitoring water quality," Estep reports. Tyler White, president of the Kentucky Coal Association, said his organization supports the decision to halt the study and the tax dollars appropriated for it would have been better spent combating health problems or drug abuse in the coalfield.

Glynis Bourd of Ohio Valley Resource reports that the effects of surface mining on health have been a concern of people in Central Appalachia for a long time. Her story includes a detailed video timeline demonstrating them.

At the Lexington meeting, Larry C. Taylor, an environmental scientist for the state Department for Environmental Protection, told the panel that a state study found there was no correlation between two metals, arsenic and chromium, in drinking water and cancer incidence and deaths in Eastern Kentucky. The metals are released by mountaintop removal and other large-scale surface mining.

Richard Wahrer of the state Department of Natural Resources said state regulators perform extensive evaluations on the impact of mining on watersheds. "Remember, water can't leave the mining site unless it is in compliance with established standards," he said. "We have not had material damage occurring outside the cumulative impact area."

Viney Aneja, a professor at North Carolina State University, reported on his study that measured the environmental exposure of residents in southwest Virginia to coal dust generated by trucks hauling coal from a nearby surface coal mine.

The study found that coarse dust particles, called PM10, often exceeded the national standards in locations both near and about one mile away from the surface mine, and on some days were three times higher than the national standards. PM10 particulates, which can be as small as 2.5 micrometers across, can easily be inhaled and pose a risk of lung damage.

Charles Snavely, secretary of the Kentucky Cabinet for Energy and the Environment and a former coal executive, said he had never heard anyone in his Eastern Kentucky community attribute a health problem to coal mining.

"I don't see how you could tell it because the problems that we have in the coalfields of Kentucky are obesity, smoking, lack of exercise, poor medical care and drug abuse," he said. "I'm sorry, I tried to stay to data . . . but I and a bunch of people who work there, grew up there, lived there our entire adult lives and I never heard that complaint once." He is a native of Prestonsburg.

Others weigh in

Luke Popovich, a spokesman for the National Mining Association, told The New York Times that the decision to halt the study may have been justified: “The National Institute of Environmental and Health Sciences concluded in July that after examining available studies, it didn’t see evidence justifying a health hazard, noting that no conclusive evidence connected mountaintop mining with health effects and that studies often failed to account for extraneous health and lifestyle effects.”

Actually, the institute said it could not reach any conclusion because the existing research had a "strong potential for bias." It called for more research and concluded: "Without such work, uncertainty will remain regarding the impact of these practices on the health of the people who breathe the air and drink the water affected by MTR mining."

The American Public Health Association said in a statement that the study's suspension shows the Trump administration's "disregard for science and evidence when it comes to the environment and safeguarding health."

U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Louisville, who has introduced legislation to block new surface-mining permits until the health risks have been determined, said in a statement: “The fact that mountaintop-removal permits have been approved when there has never been a federal study on the health effects of mountaintop-removal mining is shameful enough. To now prevent this study from being completed would be reprehensible."

National panel studying surface coal mining's effects on health sets meetings Mon. night in Hazard, Tue. afternoon in Lexington

In a study of possible health risks from large-scale strip mining, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine will hold two public meetings in Kentucky.

The first meeting will be held from 6:30 to 9 p.m. Monday, Aug. 21, at the Perry County Library, 289 Black Gold Blvd. in Hazard.

The second meeting will be held from 12:45 to 5 p.m. Tuesday at the Marriott Griffin Gate Resort, 1800 Newtown Pike in Lexington.

The study was commissioned by the Interior Department's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, citing a “growing amount of academic research that relates to possible correlations between increased health risks as a result of living near surface coal mine operations.”

Bill Estep of the Lexington Herald-Leader notes, "Several studies have concluded that mountaintop mining in Central Appalachia is associated with higher rates of cancer, heart disease and other health problems among local residents." The leading researcher has pointed to dust containing rare-earth metals as a likely cause. However, a 2012 study by a Yale University researcher and others for coal interests "did not find that mining or mining-related pollution directly contributed to health problems in Central Appalachia," Estep notes. "Rather, the results pointed to 'substantial economic and cultural disadvantages that adversely impact the health of many area residents,' the study said." The leading researcher says his work has accounted for those issues.

Information about the study can be found here. For more information, or to register to attend, email rchappetta@nas.edu or call 202-334-2766.

National committee studying health impacts of surface coal mining in Central Appalachia to have first meeting in region Tuesday

A national committee studying the health impacts of surface coal mining in Central Appalachia will have its first public meeting in the region Tuesday, May 23 at Chief Logan State Park near Logan, W.Va.

The committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine had a meeting in Washington on March 7, and has another one scheduled there for July 11. The site of a fourth meeting, set for Aug. 21, has not been announced. The study focuses on  West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee.

At Tuesday's meeting, representatives from West Virginia Bureau for Public Health, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, the West Virginia Coal Association and several environmental groups will participate in panel discussions form 12:45 to 3:45 p.m. From 6:30 to 9 p.m., a town hall meeting will allow community members will have an opportunity to address the committee. For a detailed agenda, click here.

The study is funded by a $1 million grant from the federal Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. It is examining research, primarily done by Indiana University's Michael Hendryx when he was at West Virginia University. Another study, by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, is in process.

As coal declines in Central Appalachia, what is its legacy in health, including mental health?

As the coal industry declines, rapidly in Central Appalachia, there are "clues suggesting that health and mental-health issues will pose enormous challenges to the affected coal communities, and will linger for decades," Georgia State University biology professor Roberta Attanasio writes for The Conversation US.

Appalachia's death rates are higher than in the nation as a whole, Attanasio notes: "A study that examined the elevated mortality rates in Appalachian coal mining areas for 1979-2005 linked coal mining to 'socioeconomic disadvantages' and concluded that the human cost of the Appalachian coal mining economy outweighed its economic benefits."

A retired coal miner looks at Kayford Mountain in West
Virginia in 2007. (Photo by Andrea Hopkins for Reuters)

Attanasio notes research showing correlations between mountaintop-removal mining and poor health: "They show that when mountaintop removal increases, well-being decreases. However, they do not show that mountaintop removal directly causes a decline in well-being because of the nature of the pollutants and the nature of the exposure to them. Despite the intricacy of studying this area, links to adverse outcomes such as birth defects, cancer, and lung, respiratory and kidney disease, are undeniable."

Mountaintop mining may also affect some people's mental health, Attanasio writes: "People who gain a strong sense of identity from the land are most likely to experience negative outcomes. Environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht coined the term solastalgia as 'a feeling of chronic distress caused by negatively perceived changes to a home and its landscape,' which he observed in his native Australia due to the effects of coal mining. People who experience solastalgia lack the solace or comfort provided by their home; they long for the home environment to be the way it was before. In a study of Australia published in 2007, Albrecht and collaborators documented the dominant components of solastalgia linked to open-cut coal mining in the Upper Hunter region of New South Wales – the loss of sense of place, the feeling of threats to personal health and well-being, and a sense of injustice and/or powerlessness."

Attanasio notes a survey-based study in Central Appalachian areas with and without coal "indicated that individuals who experience environmental degradation caused by mountaintop-removal mining are at increased risk for depression. The study showed that the odds of a score indicative of risk for major depression are 40 percent higher in areas subjected to mountaintop-removal mining when compared to non-mining areas. Furthermore, the risk of major depression is statistically elevated only in mountaintop-removal areas, and not in areas subjected to other forms of mining, even after statistical control for income, education and other risks."

CDC doesn't deliver on reported promise to probe health effects of surface coal mining, but other federal agencies are tackling it

When Shaping Our Appalachian Region was formed to help improve and diversify the economy of Appalachian Kentucky, one of the 10 working groups on issues was about health, which is not good in the region.

As the working group held 16 meetings around the region, it heard repeated concerns about the health impacts of surface coal mining, which has evolved from small contour-strip mines around hillsides to huge mines that take the tops off of mountains.

At every meeting, someone brought up the West Virginia University research that showed a correlation between poor health and surface mining, such as increased rates of cancer and birth defects, according to Dr. Nikki Stone, a University of Kentucky dentist in Hazard.

Dr. Nikki Stone (Photo by Mimi Pickering, Appalshop)

“It was something that people were afraid to talk about, but it came up over and over, and it ended up at the top of our list,” along with a coordinated health program in schools, Stone told Benny Becker of West Virginia Public Broadcasting. "In its final report, the working group advised that SOAR should ask a federal agency for help studying the issue," Becker notes.

But when SOAR published the working groups' ideas a few weeks later, it listed only the "shortest-term recommendations" and did not include the mining study. At the health session of SOAR's "Strategy Summit" in May 2015, Dee Davis of the Whitesburg-based Center for Rural Strategies asked the moderator/presenter, Jennifer "Jenna" Seymour of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, what if anything was being done about the recommendation. Seymour replied that she wasn't aware of it. But when questioned about it, she said that she had heard about it.

Davis told Becker that CDC Director Thomas Frieden told the working group when it presented its recommendations that if they made a request the CDC would investigate. "Davis said that as far as he knows, that was the last time anybody from the CDC acknowledged the request. The CDC recently confirmed that the agency is not engaged in any such research," Becker reports. "It’s not clear where exactly things got stalled, but SOAR Executive Director Jared Arnett said there’s a reason why the group tends to steer clear of environmental issues."

“It’s about uniting, and a lot of things that may not be a part of SOAR that people want to be a part of SOAR are very divisive,” Arnett told Becker. He said earlier that the group would focus its health efforts on substance abuse, obesity and diabetes.

Davis told Becker, “If we want our talent to be part of what turns our region around, then it’s not really going to help us to sweep big questions about cancer and birth defects under the rug. . . . It’s about building an economy in a place,” Davis said, “and part of that is making sure that our communities are places people want to live.”

But while CDC hasn't acted, two other federal agencies have. At the request of the state of West Virginia, the federal Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement gave the National Academy of Sciences $1 million to examine existing research, primarily done by Indiana University's Michael Hendryx when he was at West Virginia University. "Another study, from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, was announced last year, and has already produced a draft," Becker reports. "NIEHS Director Linda Birnbaum recently visited eastern Kentucky and said she expects that study will be released within the year."

West Virginia researcher says mountaintop-removal mining correlates with poor health in Central Appalachia, including Ky.

Michael Hendryx

By Tim Mandell
Kentucky Health News

No apparent health disparity exists in Appalachia except in areas where mountaintop removal is occurring, said Michael Hendryx, professor at the School of Public Health at Indiana University, during a lecture Thursday at the University of Kentucky. Hendrix's lecture, "Mountaintop Mining and Public Health," examined scientific research—conducted by him and others—into health effects in Appalachia since large-scale mountaintop removal was introduced in the 1990s. Hendrix, who was part of a 2010 study that called for an end of mountaintop removal, did most of his research in West Virginia, which shares most of the Central Applachian coalfield with Kentucky.

Hendrix presented data comparing Appalachian areas that have mountaintop removal with Appalachian areas without it, showing that heart, lung and kidney disease, cardiovascular and respiratory disease, and birth defects are all typically more common in areas with mountaintop removal. Also, air and drinking-water pollution—consisting of both well water and public water—are usually higher in mountaintop removal areas.

Hendryx said politicians have stood in the way of eliminating mountaintop removal, despite plenty of scientific evidence of its negative impact on public health. "It's surprising the political and economic power that the coal industry still has," he said. "It doesn't produce the jobs that it used to. It's clearly in decline. Yet it seems to me that politicians will still fall all over each to see who's more pro-coal, and that still seems to influence voters."

While some have called efforts for clean energy a "war on coal," Hendryx argues that coal-depressed communities can find other ways to improve local economies. "Some of the regions have coal; some don't," he said. "They're hilly, they're forested, they're rural . . . the places that didn't have coal developed other ways for people to make a living. . . . If you look at the data, it's clear that the areas that have the heaviest mining have the highest unemployment rates, the highest poverty rates, the lowest income levels. The other areas that didn't have coal developed better alternatives to generate better economies."

Asked for a reply, Kentucky Coal Association President Bill Bissett said, “Anti-coal ideologue Michael Hendryx continues his road show against coal production and use by, once again, committing sins of commission in discussing his research. He won’t tell you that he gathers his data by employing environmental groups, like Restore Eden, to do his interviews, so should we expect any result than one that agrees with this anti-coal agenda?"

Opioid overdose deaths remain a huge concern in poverty-stricken Eastern Kentucky counties; Boston Globe takes note

Drug overdoses from opioid use remain a concern in Eastern Kentucky, especially in poverty-stricken regions where coal mines have shuttered, Brian MacQaurrie reports for The Boston Globe. In 2014 Kentucky had 1,087 deaths from opioid overdoses, more than from traffic mishaps.

In Bell County (Wikipedia map) nearly two-thirds of adults "do not have jobs, and addiction to opioid painkillers has metastasized," MacQuarrie writes. "Miners often turned to painkillers after injuries, and many of their children became dependent on opioids stashed as close as the medicine cabinet. Nearly everyone here knows someone who has become addicted or died from opioids."

"The opioid death rate in 2013 was 93.2 per 100,000 people in Bell County, nearly double that of any other Kentucky county," MacQuarrie writes. "But C. Frank Rapier, who directs a federal task force attacking the epidemic in Appalachia, said the devastation in Bell County also reflects what is happening in neighboring counties, where federal officials believe opioid deaths have been grossly underreported."

"The death rate in Bell County dropped in 2014, but the figure remains troublingly high," MacQuarrie writes. "Many children are raised by grandparents, some mothers prostitute their daughters, and hospice providers lock medications in theft-proof safes at the homes of the soon-to-be deceased. Nancy Hale, who leads the drug-prevention efforts in the region, told him, “We’ve lost a whole generation of people who would have been paying taxes, and buying homes, and contributing to society."

Former state trooper and Pineville native Micky Hatmaker said the blame mostly falls on big pharmaceutical companies for "aggressively marketing painkillers and on unscrupulous doctors and pharmacists who dispense them," MacQuarrie writes. Hatmaker told him, “This thing took over Appalachia like a cancer." Purdue Pharma paid a federal-court settlement of hundreds of millions of dollars in 2007 for its promotion of Oxycontin, and Kentucky has its own lawsuit pending.

In an attempt to eliminate pill mills, Kentucky in 2012 became the first state "to enact a strict mandate that physicians check a patient’s drug history before writing new prescriptions," MacQuarrie writes. As part of the plan, Attorney General Jack Conway has been "aggressively targeting doctors whose practices are designed to profit from addiction." As a result, "prescriptions of oxycodone, a powerful opioid, have dropped 10.5 percent. Prescriptions for hydrocodone—also used to relieve pain—have fallen 11 percent."

Judges have handed down harsher sentences for owners of pain clinics, including a 14-year sentence given in June to the owner of two clinics, MacQuarrie writes. Another area of success "has been Operation UNITE, a large nonprofit group that has carried a drug-prevention message to tens of thousands of students in venues from classrooms to archery camps. More than 3,700 people have received $5,000 vouchers from the group for substance-abuse treatment. And police detectives working with Operation UNITE have removed $12.3 million of drugs from the street since 2003." Operation UNITE has received much federal funding, thanks to House Appropriations Committee Chairman Harold "Hal" Rogers, who represents most of Eastern Kentucky.

The Boston Globe did its story because Massachusetts also faces an opioid overdose epidemic, with 1,256 deaths from opioid overdoses in 2014. That has led to a shared bond between the two states, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) joining forces to ask for a surgeon general’s report on the crisis and detailed answers on how the Department of Health and Human Services will measure progress on opioid deaths and addiction. (Read more)