The Interior Department announced Wednesday more than $119 million meant to aid communities reclaiming abandoned coal mines — part of President Donald Trump’s agenda to achieve American energy dominance.
Two tribes were named as grant recipients.
The Navajo Nation and Crow Tribe of Montana are among 24 coal-producing states getting federal dollars, including Wyoming, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico.
Between the pair of tribes, they tallied $607,376 in federal funding stemming from the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977. The Crow Tribe got $148,721, while the Navajo Nation secured $458,655.
On top of that, the federal agency on Thursday announced another $3.67 million each for the Navajo Nation, Crow Tribe and Hopi Tribe through the Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization Program, which is supposed to help states and tribes by “turning legacy coal mining sites into engines of economic growth.”
Despite diversifying and transitioning to some sources of renewable energy, like solar, the Navajo Nation still heavily depends on coal to fuel its economy — even though the Navajo Generating Station in Page and nearby mines at Black Mesa and Kayenta all shut down within the last two decades.
Four Corners Power Plant, owned by APS, solely relies on coal coming from the Navajo Mine near Fruitland in New Mexico. It produces almost 5 million tons of coal annually, generating over a third of the tribe’s general fund.
Trump signed a slate of executive orders in April, aiming to boost the industry.
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Established in 1924 by President Calvin Coolidge, Chiricahua National Monument is known by many as the “Wonderland of Rocks” — home to its iconic rhyolite pinnacles, which are made from volcanic ash and lava eroding over time. -
Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren made his third annual state address in Shiprock on Tuesday, outlining his administration’s accomplishments amid ongoing efforts to remove him from office before his term expires this year. -
That pending land swap between the U.S. Forest Service and a multinational mining company would result in a six-decade underground copper project that is estimated to create a two-mile-wide crater, devouring an Apache holy site called Oak Flat. -
Tribes are still figuring out how to start and finish renewable energy projects amid the Trump administration freezing or eliminating federal dollars from the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act, which directed more than $720 million to Indian Country. -
Scientists, writers, artists and others with an interest in the Colorado River got together recently in Moab, Utah, for an event called Rivers of Change.
