Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 91.djvu/515

 PUBLIC LAW 95-87—AUG. 3, 1977 mental officials in the local political subdivision in which the area of land to be affected is located that a permit has been issued and shall describe the location of the land. (b) No permit or revision application shall be approved unless the application affirmatively demonstrates and the regulatory authority finds in writing on the basis of the information set forth in the application or from information otherwise available which will be documented in the approval, and made available to the applicant, that— (1) the permit application is accurate and complete and that all the requirements of this Act and the State or Federal program have been complied with; (2) the applicant has demonstrated that reclamation as required by this Act and the State or Federal program can be accomplished under the reclamation plan contained in the permit application; (3) the assessment of the probable cumulative impact of all anticipated mining in the area on the hydrologic balance specified in section 507(b) has been made by the regulatory authority and the proposed operation thereof has been designed to prevent material damage to hydrologic balance outside permit area; (4) the area proposed to be mined is not included within an area designated unsuitable for surface coal mining pursuant to section 522 of this Act or is not within an area under study for such designation in an administrative proceeding commenced pursuant to section 522(a)(4)(D) or section 522(c) (unless in such an area as to which an administrative proceeding has commenced pursuant to section 522(a)(4)(D) of this Act, the operator making the permit application demonstrates that, prior to January 1, 1977, he has made substantial legal and financial commitments in relation to the operation for which he is applying for a permit); (5) the proposed surface coal mining operation, if located west of the one hundredth meridian west longitude, would— (A) not interrupt, discontinue, or preclude farming on alluvial valley floors that are irrigated or naturally vSubirrigated. but, excluding undeveloped range lands which are not significant to farming on said alluvial valley floors and those lands as to which the regulatory authority finds that if the farming that will be interrupted, discontinued, or precluded is of such small acreage as to be of negligible impact on the farm's agricultural production, or (B) not materially damage the quantity or quality of water in surface or underground water systems that supply these valley floors in (A) of subsection (b)(5),: Provided, That this paragraph (5) shall not affect those surface coal mining operaticms which in the year preceding the enactment of this Act (I) produced coal in commercial quantities, and were located within or adjacent to alluvial valley floors or (II) had obtained specific permit approval by the State regulatory authority to conduct surface coal mining operations within said alluvial valley floors. With respect to such surface mining operations which would have been within the purview of the foregoing proviso but for the fact that no coal was so produced in commercial quantities and no such specific permit aoDroval was so received, the Secretary, if he determines that substantial financial and legal commitments were made by an operator prior to January 1, 1977, in connection with any such operation, is

91 STAT. 481

Requirements, •:;

•

Post, p. 507.

Coal exchange programs,

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