In a pair of controversial environmental decisions, the Biden administration is moving to end all new coal leasing in the country's largest producing coal region, the Powder River Basin of Wyoming and Montana.
, the BLM's Buffalo, Wyoming field office ruled that new coal leasing would have significant impacts on human health and the climate, due to the coal being burned at power plants."highly polluting coal in the ground." The new rule won't shut down the coal industry in the region as companies can still move to develop federal leases that have already been issued. But it comes at a time whenWyoming is the nation's top coal producer, accounting for, Wyoming Republican Senator John Barrasso accused the Biden administration of"waging war on Wyoming's coal communities and families."