Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 91.djvu/516

 91 STAT. 482

43 USC 1716.

Notices of violations. Rules and regulations.

Penalty.

Prime farmland mining, permit.

PUBLIC LAW 95-87—AUG. 3, 1977 authorized, in accordance with such regulations as the Secretary may prescribe, to enter into an agreement with that operator pursuant to which the Secretary may, notwithstanding any other provision of law, lease other Federal coal deposits to such operator in exchange for the relinquishment by such operator of his Federal lease covering coal deposits involving such mining operations, or pursuant to section 206 of Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, convey to the fee holder of any such coal deposits involving such mining operations the fee title to other available Federal coal deposits in exchange for the fee title to such deposits so involving such mining operations. It is the policy of the Congress that the Secretary shall develop and carry out a coal exchange program to acquire private fee coal precluded from being mined by the restrictions of this paragraph (5) in exchange for Federal coal which is not so precluded. Such exchanges shall be made under section 206 of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976; (6) in cases where the private mineral estate has been severed from the private surface estate, the applicant has submitted to the regulatory authority— (A) the written consent of the surface owner to the extraction of coal by surface mining methods; or (B) a conveyance that expressly grants or reserves the right to extract the coal by surface mining methods; or (C) if the conveyance does not expressly grant the right to extract coal by surface mining methods, the surface-subsurface legal relationship shall be determined in accordance with State law: Provided, That nothing in this Act shall be construed to authorize the regulatory authority to adjudicate property rights disputes. (c) The applicant shall file with his permit application a schedule listing any and all notices of violations of this Act and any law, rule, or regulation of the United States, or of any department or agency in the United States pertaining to air or water environmental protection incurred by the applicant in connection with any surface coal mining operation during the three-year period prior to the date of application. The schedule shall also indicate the final resolution of any such notice of violation. Where the schedule or other information available to the regulatory authority indicates that any surface coal mining operation owned or controlled by the applicant is currently in violation of this Act or such other laws referred to this subsection, the permit shall not be issued until the applicant submits proof that such violation has been corrected or is in the process of being corrected to the satisfaction of the regulatory authority, department, or agency which has jurisdiction over such violation and no permit shall be issued to an applicant after a finding by the regulatory authority, after opportunity for hearing, that the applicant, or the operator specified in the application, controls or has controlled mining operations with a demonstrated pattern of willful violations of this Act of such nature and duration with such resulting irreparable damage to the environment as to indicate an intent not to comply with the provisions of this Act. (d)(1) In addition to finding the application in compliance with subsection (b) of this Section, if the area proposed to be mined contains prime farmland pursuant to Section 507(b) (16), the regulatory authority shall, after consultation with the Secretary of Agriculture, and pursuant to regulations issued hereunder by the Secretary of Interior with the concurrence of the Secretary of Agriculture, grant a

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