Interior faces lawsuit over San Juan river pollution

A group of conservation and citizen organizations served a 60-day intent to sue yesterday to the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Surface Mining for failing to conduct Endangered Species Act consultations prior to authorizing the renewal of an operating permit for the Navajo Coal Mine in northwest New Mexico.Their suit references a draft biological assessment prepared about the San Juan river, in preparation for a proposed coal fired power plant in the region. The groups say the agency was required to consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to avoid impacts to threatened and endangered species from the mining of coal at Navajo Mine, its combustion at Four Corners Power Plant and coal-combustion waste dumping. Interestingly, the group will use a draft Fish and Wildlife “biological opinion” for the proposed Desert Rock coal-fired power plant to substantiate their lawsuit. The biological assessment concludes that mercury and selenium pollution from regional coal combustion, including from Four Corners Power Plant, would be “likely to jeopardize the continued existence of the Colorado pike minnow and razorback sucker” — two highly endangered fish species in the San Juan River, a tributary to the Colorado...more