CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- West Virginia regulators and coal operators have not properly implemented state rules meant to keep strip mining from contributing to flooding during heavy rains over narrow mountain hollows, according to a new federal report.

Mine operators have inconsistently applied computer modeling in permit applications, and state regulators have approved those applications anyway, according to the U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement report.

In addition, the state Department of Environmental Protection does not do follow-up studies to see if permit models were accurate, and DEP regulations require no long-term pre- and post-mining runoff monitoring, OSM said in its report.

Officials from the OSM's Charleston field office conducted their oversight study to weigh the effectiveness of the DEP's program to require Surface Water Run-off Analysis, or SWROA, for every new strip-mining permit application. The DEP came up with the plan after severe flooding in 2001 that was widely blamed, at least in part, on strip mining, and led to ongoing litigation against mine operators and land-owning companies.

In the study, the OSM pointed out several problems it discovered when reviewing a small sampling of DEP-approved permits with SWROAs in them:

| In one instance, the permit designer assumed a runoff catch basin was dry before a storm hit. The OSM said, "a more conservative, or safer, approach" would have been to assume the structure was full before the rain.

| Another time, a company permit designer assumed changes in topography that shortened the travel time for runoff, inflating the pre-mining peak flows -- and making any increase because of mining seem smaller.

| Overall, worst-case mining scenarios did not consider the "critical situation" when valley-fill sites are totally denuded and dumping begins. "If the site is not stage cleared and adequate ditches and detention structures in place to compensate for the drastic changes in ground cover, then peak runoff leaving the site will increase," the OSM study said.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- West Virginia regulators and coal operators have not properly implemented state rules meant to keep strip mining from contributing to flooding during heavy rains over narrow mountain hollows, according to a new federal report.

Mine operators have inconsistently applied computer modeling in permit applications, and state regulators have approved those applications anyway, according to the U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement report.

In addition, the state Department of Environmental Protection does not do follow-up studies to see if permit models were accurate, and DEP regulations require no long-term pre- and post-mining runoff monitoring, OSM said in its report.

Officials from the OSM's Charleston field office conducted their oversight study to weigh the effectiveness of the DEP's program to require Surface Water Run-off Analysis, or SWROA, for every new strip-mining permit application. The DEP came up with the plan after severe flooding in 2001 that was widely blamed, at least in part, on strip mining, and led to ongoing litigation against mine operators and land-owning companies.

In the study, the OSM pointed out several problems it discovered when reviewing a small sampling of DEP-approved permits with SWROAs in them:

| In one instance, the permit designer assumed a runoff catch basin was dry before a storm hit. The OSM said, "a more conservative, or safer, approach" would have been to assume the structure was full before the rain.

| Another time, a company permit designer assumed changes in topography that shortened the travel time for runoff, inflating the pre-mining peak flows -- and making any increase because of mining seem smaller.

| Overall, worst-case mining scenarios did not consider the "critical situation" when valley-fill sites are totally denuded and dumping begins. "If the site is not stage cleared and adequate ditches and detention structures in place to compensate for the drastic changes in ground cover, then peak runoff leaving the site will increase," the OSM study said.

The OSM also found that the state's regulations allow mine operators to use one discharge-monitoring site as representative for an entire mine site that could cover hundreds of acres over multiple watersheds.

In one instance, the representative point was in a drainage area in which the only mining activity was placement of additional waste rock and dirt in an existing valley fill. "By placing the monitoring point in this location, the data collected at the site would show a reduction in run-off for that particular drainage area that does not accurately depict how the overall mining operation is affecting all impacted drainage areas," the OSM said.

OSM officials also explained that a major obstacle for the state's program is "a lack of a mechanism to measure its effect."

"The current regulations do not include a requirement that stormwater runoff peak discharges be measured," the OSM report said. "Nor do the regulations require actual measurement of pre-mining discharges, or real-time correlation between rainfall and runoff."

While coalfield residents have pointed to mountaintop removal as a contributing cause for this spring's heavy flooding in southern parts of West Virginia, Gov. Joe Manchin has said the floods were "an act of God."

According to the OSM report, DEP officials concurred in the federal government's findings. The DEP agreed to hold an industry seminar and better train its employees to try to fix some of the problems.

Also, the report said the DEP "will monitor its violation history on a yearly basis to determine if there are offsite impacts related to excessive peak discharges.

"Depending on the field conditions, WVDEP may consider further changes to the SWROA process including increased monitoring and verification of the models," the OSM report said.

Reach Ken Ward Jr. at kw...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-1702.