What happened: To keep in line with the Obama administration’s priorities, leaders at the US Geological Survey (USGS) pulled funding for a research project that examined the public health effects of mountaintop removal coal mining.
Why it matters: It sets a dangerous precedent to halt research by stopping its funding due to political considerations. Funding for a scientific research project at a federal agency is rarely canceled and the reasons for doing are primarily due to extraordinary circumstances like unethical practices or mismanagement of funds.
In February 2013, leaders at the US Geological Survey’s (USGS) Energy Resources Program canceled a scientific study to examine the public health effects of mountaintop removal coal mining; the decision was carried out to better align with the priorities of the Obama administration.
The USGS scientists who were examining human health effects from mountaintop removal coal mining were ordered by agency managers to switch to a different research project. The different research project was on the health and environmental effects of unconventional oil and gas extraction, such as hydraulic fracturing – also called fracking – in the Marcellus Shale region of Pennsylvania and Northern West Virginia. Douglas Duncan, interim director of the USGS Energy Resources Program, stated that the decision came about because the agency noted that natural gas and fracking operations were an important component of President Obama’s energy strategy.
One former USGS scientist, Lynn Crosby, who was hired to help conduct this research, stated that they believe that political pressure played a major part in this decision, especially after the coal industry learned about the study. Crosby also stated that USGS managers were sensitive to the criticisms from the coal industry and wanted the USGS research team to work with the Appalachian Research Initiative for Environmental Science, an industry-funded effort to improve coal mine research. Additionally, a former West Virginia University researcher, Michael Hendryx, whose research prompted the USGS study on mountaintop removal coal mining, also believed that political reasons was the underlying cause of the USGS decision. Specifically, Hendryx believed that the USGS decision was due, at least in part, to the coal industry’s efforts to undermine studies that provided evidence of people’s health being harmed by this form of coal extraction.
Before the study was canceled, USGS scientists had examined evidence reported by residents who lived near Southern West Virginia’s large-scale mining operations of increased risks of serious illnesses, including birth defects, cancer, and premature death. The research team had already completed several presentations for scientific conferences, had one paper undergoing review by a journal, and a second paper going through internal USGS review. The first paper, which was eventually published in the journal Environmental Geochemistry and Health, found that particulate matter air pollution near mine sites that practiced mountaintop removal coal mining were several times higher than at control sites. The paper stated that more research was needed to determine if this pollution corresponded with reports of increased rates of cancer, respiratory disease, cardiovascular disease, and overall mortality in Appalachian surface mining areas compared to Appalachian non-mining areas.
USGS leaders canceled the research project due to political considerations, thereby placing political interests over scientific considerations. By failing to carry out this research, USGS denied residents of West Virginia and other communities located close to mountaintop removal coal mining sites of scientific information on the potential human health effects from this practice, information that that the government could have used to carry out science-based decisionmaking to protect the health and safety of underserved communities living near these sites.