Standing on a bench, Steve Charter, left, and son Ressa hold a mock coal sale in front of the BLM offices on Monday. About 50 people showed up to support Bull Mountain ranchers in their protest of the coal lease sale bid that will be revealed this Wednesday.
By Northern Plains Resource Council
Bull Mountain ranchers on Monday led 50 supporters in a mock “preferred customer appreciation sale” to draw attention to coal being leased beneath their rangeland. The sale was held in front of the Billings office of the federal Bureau of Land Management.
This Wednesday, BLM will open sealed bids for about 35 million tons of new coal adjacent to the Signal Peak coal mine 20 miles north of Billings. The mine is owned by Signal Peak Energy, which last month was partially bought by Gunvor, an international energy marketer based in Switzerland. They plan to expand their underground, longwall mining operation and ship the coal to be burned in coal plants in Asia.
“Welcome to the Bureau of Land Management’s preferred customer appreciation sale,” hawked Ressa Charter, whose family has ranched in the Bull Mountains for three generations. “Signal Peak Energy is our favorite and ONLY customer…. This is the sale of the century, three seams of technologically recoverable coal for the price of one.”
In a more serious vein, rancher Steve Charter explained that this Wednesday, “BLM will be literally giving away millions of tons of coal at rock bottom prices,” coal that is owned by the U.S. government that should be fetching a higher price for taxpayers. And not only is the coal undervalued, BLM is giving away multiple layers of coal seams under the guise of leasing only one seam. In fact, there are 14 layers of coal in this sale whereas “the monetary and environmental evaluation of this coal is based solely on mining the Mammoth seam” while Signal Peak has been publicly quoted as planning to mine others as well.
Rancher Ellen Pfister has seen land subsidence on her rangeland already because of the current mining, leaving deep cracks in the land. The Charters would be affected by the new lease. “The entire destructive process of subsidence” would happen at least three times on his land, Steve Charter said. “The BLM has made no consideration of the impacts of mining these additional seams as required by law.”
“Why is the BLM giving away the American public’s coal – your coal – at a time of service budget cuts,” Charter added.
The ranchers are long-time members of Bull Mountain Land Alliance, and their families were among the original founders of Northern Plains Resource Council, a conservation and family agriculture group that has organized Montana citizens to protect our water quality, family farms and ranches, and our unique quality of life since 1971.
Lease sale update Nov. 16, 2011
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has rejected the only bid it received at its November 16 coal lease sale. The bid did not meet or exceed BLM’s estimate of the fair market value of the tracts.
Signal Peak Energy LLC submitted the high bid of $5,325,000 ($0.15 per recoverable ton) for five unleased coal tracts in Musselshell. The BLM offered the tracts for sale in response to Signal Peak’s coal lease application. The tracts are located approximately 12 miles south of Roundup and are adjacent to Signal Peak’s Bull Mountains Mine No 1.
Signal Peak Energy LLC may request the Montana/Dakotas BLM to offer the coal lease tracts for sale again. The Montana/Dakotas BLM would consider reoffering the coal tracts for sale if it receives a written request to that effect from Signal Peak Energy LLC.
