Mine Reclamation

The state will receive nearly $27 million from the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement. That’s in addition to the $140 million the state received in February.

State lawmakers wrapped up energy related legislation in the final hours of the session, including a bill to create a Mining Mutual Insurance Company.

An audit last year found the state’s special reclamation fund is insufficient to cover the cost of cleaning up the state’s mine sites. State lawmakers are proposing a Mining Mutual Insurance Company that would issue bonds to cover those liabilities.

Members of the public and news organizations would not be able to attend or view the board’s activities, nor would they be able to request documents about them.

Senate Bill 1 would create a Mining Mutual Insurance Company to issue mine reclamation bonds backed by at least $50 million in taxpayer funds.

The bill establishes a mining mutual insurance company. The company would sell bonds for mine reclamation and serve as a backstop to the existing Special Reclamation Fund.

Concerns over vulnerable mine reclamation bonds in West Virginia has the Senate attempting to be proactive according to Senate President Craig Blair (R-Berkeley) who introduced Senate Bill 1, “Creating a Mining Mutual Insurance Company” on the first day of the 2022 legislative session.

The bipartisan infrastructure bill that became law last month has billions of dollars in it for roads, bridges, airports and transit systems in the Ohio Valley. The law also addresses some of the region’s other pressing needs.

A judge in Frankfort on Tuesday ordered Justice to pay a nearly $3 million penalty, plus interest, over mine reclamation work at three sites in eastern Kentucky that was not completed before deadline.

Manchin told reporters at the Capitol Monday that the House of Representatives should vote on a bipartisan infrastructure bill the Senate approved in August.