Below is TCS President Ryan Alexander’s statement on the Interior Department’s announcement today of a series of public listening sessions on the Federal Coal Program (available here).

Taxpayers are NOT receiving a fair return from the mining of coal on federal lands.

Taxpayers for Common Sense welcomes the decision by the Bureau of Land Management to consider reforming the federal coal program, including increasing the royalty rate companies pay to federal taxpayers for the right to mine and sell publicly owned coal. Federal coal has one of the lowest effective royalty rates among natural resources managed by the BLM, as rates have not increased since the passage of the Mineral Leasing Act in 1920. BLM should review all of the ways in which the federal government is being shortchanged, including the Lease by Application process that allows industry to control where leasing occurs and results in non-competitive and below fair market value bids for federal coal leases. BLM has a fiduciary responsibility to taxpayers to responsibly manage all public assets, the development of which represents a significant revenue source for the federal government.

At the end of this review, BLM must comprehensively update the rules and ensure the program is being managed in taxpayers interest and they are getting a fair return on their assets.

Photo credit: wallyg via flickr