A new federal rule aims to reduce miners’ exposure to silica dust, a leading cause of black lung disease (Getty Images).
It was a celebratory moment years in the making when Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su, flanked by miners and lawyers, announced Tuesday the rollout of a new rule limiting silica dust exposure for Uniontown miners.
For years, mine safety advocates had urged the federal government to adopt strict regulations around the substance, which has led to a rise in serious cases of black lung among young miners. Eventually one was announced.
“For too long we have accepted this as the way things are for people who work in the mines,” Su said Tuesday in Uniontown. “They have had to work without the same protection from silica dust as people in other industries, even though we knew about the harmful effects of silica dust.”
Mine safety advocates largely agree that the rule is a positive change. But some are concerned that it still leaves too much power in the hands of mining companies rather than regulators, and that there is uncertainty about how to enforce this.
“Overall, the rule is a step in the right direction, and it’s what we’ve been calling for for years,” said Erin Bates, spokesperson for the United Mine Workers of America. “But coal operators will ultimately have to be held accountable.”
During the past years, severe cases of black lung disease are more common. One of the main causes is silica dust. Contact with the substance is becoming more common because the Appalachians have been mined so aggressively that miners are digging into increasingly narrow seams of coal. Silica dust is created when miners break through the rocks around these seams.
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The new rule creates a limit on silica dust exposure levels and requires mining companies to actively monitor it. The new limit, 50 micrograms per cubic meter of air, is half of what is currently allowed, and has long been advocated by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, along with others.
But the rule relies largely on mining companies themselves to measure the quality of air in their mines and alert regulators when silica dust levels exceed the new limit.
This is partly, Bates says, because the Mine Safety and Health Administration simply doesn’t have the funding to regularly take air samples at mines across the country. Still, she compared the rule to asking motorists to enforce the speed limit.
“How many times is a driver going to call the police and say, ‘Hey, you know what, I’m really sorry,’” Bates said. “‘I went for 75 in a 55. Go ahead and write me a card.'”
“But the fact that there is something out there that we can fight and use is huge,” Bates said. “Every time we identify a violation, we can refer back to this rule… Previously, when we discovered that there were high levels of silica dust in our mines, there was nothing we could do.”
(Getty Images)
Rebecca Shelton is policy director of the Appalachian Citizens Law Center, a group that has advocated for silica dust regulation.
“I got into this job because I was actually from Kentucky,” Shelton said. “Everyone knows someone with black lung, it seems. I think for most people in this country this is a fairly foreign or distant concept: that someone in your family has an illness related to his or her occupation and the occupational hazards.”
Like Bates, Shelton believes the rule is a positive step but has concerns about its enforcement.
And Shelton worries that the Mine Safety and Health Administration may not be up to the task of enforcement, even if companies do report silica dust levels above the established limit.
“Something we’ve been pushing for for a long time is that MSHA just get the funding they need to hire more inspectors,” Shelton said. “There has been a decline in the number of inspectors over the past decade, especially for the coal mining industry… It makes it more difficult to implement stricter enforcement.”
a Report November 2023 A release from the U.S. Office of Inspector General found that MSHA was struggling to keep up with workplace enforcement regulations. In announcing the final rule, Su noted that the agency is hiring an additional 270 inspectors to help with its enforcement.
The rule will come into effect in one year for coal mines, and in two years for all other types of mines.
“I think we need to figure out how to monitor the implementation of this rule and find our way forward from there,” Shelton said. She added that the lack of specified thresholds for penalties for mine operators who violate the rule would exacerbate enforcement problems.
Willie Dodson, a field coordinator with Appalachian Voices, a group that works closely with Shelton’s, said in a statement that a major concern was that the rule does not require mining companies to close their mines if silica dust levels are too high.
“Without strong enforcement mechanisms, and without any bans against miners forced to work in excessive dust, I am not confident this will actually reduce the amount of black lung,” Dodson said in a statement. “This rule gives MSHA too much leeway if automatic enforcement actions should occur.”
The rule gives MSHA the authority to take a number of actions if silica dust limits exceed the new limit, from financial penalties to closing unsafe mines.
A spokesperson for the Department of Labor told Capital-Star that it is prepared to take all available measures if a mining company does not take action “within a reasonable time” to reduce silica dust levels.
Sam Petsonk, a West Virginia attorney and mine safety advocate, was optimistic about the prospects for enforcement. He believes the rule’s language is stricter than other similar regulations that preceded it.
“This rule is a stronger dust protection rule than MSHA has ever promulgated before when it comes to the strictness of the limit and the tolerance for violations,” he said.
Petsonk believes the rule’s language will allow MSHA to take action against coal companies much more quickly than previous rules limiting other airborne pollutants in mines. As an example, he cited a 2014 rule regulating coal dust levels, which generally required multiple hazardous air samples to be collected before regulators could act. This rule, he said, would require only one.
Petsonk also praised MSHA for adding language to the rule requiring mining companies to regularly come up with plans on how they will limit exposure to silica dust and submit them to regulators.
“This rule recognizes that the operator must devise a better way to avoid extreme silica exposure,” Petsonk said. “That is a real innovation. That is something that is new in this rule.”
But Petsonk understands that enforcing the rule comes down to who is in charge of the agency. At this point, he is confident that the current administration is committed to enforcing the rule to the fullest extent possible.
“I always believe in the adage: trust, but verify,” Petsonk said. And he believes the current rule, along with what he saw as the agency’s willingness to adjust it in light of criticism received during the public comment period, is at least the beginning of verification.
Bates, the UMWA spokesman, is less certain than Petsonk. She says the union is concerned the rule will allow mining to continue, even in mines where excessive levels of silica dust are measured. Although mining companies are required to take corrective action when silica levels are high, one of these measures is noted: requiring miners to wear appropriate respirators. The union would prefer to stop work altogether at a mine where levels are too high until it can continue safely.
“We strongly advocated that the agency not require respirators when miners were exposed to silica levels above the exposure limit,” Bates said. “Frankly, we believe that if there is overexposure, work should stop completely.”
Bates pointed out another aspect of the rule that she found troubling. In the final published rule, MSHA included studies on the potential efficacy of the new limit of 50 micrograms per cubic meter of airborne silica dust. The studies also looked at how effective an even lower limit of 25 micrograms per cubic meter would be.
Overall, these studies found that the lower limit would expose only half of miners to what they believed would be an excessive risk of disease. But that’s not where the agency ended up.
“It’s absolutely no surprise,” Bates said. “Ultimately, the lives of the miners are the most important thing. It is a shame that thirty and forty year olds contract this disease.”
For Bates and others, knowing that stricter regulations would result in fewer miner deaths is just proof that there is more work to be done.
Postmine safety advocates agree the new silica dust rule is progress, but some worry it isn’t enough. first appeared on Pennsylvania Capital-Star.
