WASHINGTON, D.C.—The National Mining Association (NMA) hailed a federal court decision in Murray Energy Corp. v. McCarthy ordering the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to submit a plan for conducting the evaluations of job losses related to the agency’s regulations. NMA filed a brief with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce supporting Murray Energy’s claims that section 321 of the Clean Air Act imposed an ongoing duty on EPA to conduct evaluations of the employment consequences of its regulatory actions.
“America’s coal miners scored an important victory today when a federal court told EPA that it could no longer ignore its ongoing responsibility under the Clean Air Act to evaluate the job losses arising from its stream of regulatory actions,” said NMA president and CEO Hal Quinn. “The court properly rebuked EPA for representing that it sufficed for the agency to merely predict impacts but it was under no duty to later verify the actual outcomes. Murray Energy Corporation has performed a great service not only for coal miners but all American workers whose jobs are imperiled by unbalanced regulations imposing great costs with little if any measurable benefit.”