Ohio-based Murray Energy Corp, which owns Maple Creek Mining and UMCO Energy, sought an emergency order to allow mining to continue after the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection ruled that the stream is perennial.
The mine was shut down by Murray Energy president Robert E. Murray on November 12 after receiving the state Department of Environmental Protection's decision to allow only room and pillar mining under the springs and tributary, reported Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
UMCO asked the state Environmental Hearing Board to overturn the ruling and the board heard the case November 19.
The government's policy towards stream management has changed over the past two years, with the DEP now requiring mining companies to apply for stream encroachment permits where subsidence could be possible.
Judge Bernard A. Labuskes Jr denied the company the opportunity to move the High Quality Mine's longwall mining operation under the springs and tributary..
Michael Gardner, a spokesman for the company, said the mine remains closed and there are no plans to reopen it. Murray's attorneys are reviewing the board's ruling to determine if an appeal will be filed.
In his 29-page opinion Labuskes wrote "The nearly complete elimination of springs, seeps, wetlands and a stream does not preserve the stream's value or protect its reasonably foreseeable uses, whatever they may be".
Associated Press reported that Murray contended at the board hearing in Pittsburgh the stream was little more than a ditch that intermittently runs and was used by one farmer to water his animals.
"This is putting my life's work ... into bankruptcy over a ditch in which there is no water flow at times," Murray said last week. "... There are 497 people's lives that are being destroyed over a ditch."
Murray testified he would be unable to meet contractual commitments to supply 12,000 tons of coal a day from the mine if not allowed to use longwall mining methods.
