October 6, 2026 - Colorado air regulators say the West Elk coal mine near Somerset has put out nearly four times the volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, that its air permit allows. Its 12-month total reached 1,723 tons in May, against a limit of 465 tons. In August, the state's Air Pollution Control Division sent the mine a compliance advisory warning that sanctions may follow, the Colorado Sun reported.

Michael Booth, the Sun's environment writer, told KVNF the advisory is "really a warning letter to West Elk saying, hey, your records and our inspections show that you are emitting way above what you're permitted to."

VOCs can cause breathing problems and help form ground-level ozone. Booth said the mine's methane is "more of a climate change issue and not a local issue, but the VOCs that go along with it absolutely can be a local issue."

The limit West Elk exceeded is for VOCs, not methane, but "it all comes out in one plume," said Auden Schendler, who burns methane for carbon credits at an old mine near Paonia. Jeremy Nichols of the Center for Biological Diversity told the Sun that West Elk is "the single largest industrial source of methane in Colorado." The center told Booth, who shared its answer with KVNF, that the mine's methane in 2023 equaled the yearly emissions of nearly 70,000 cars.

Environmental groups have pushed West Elk to flare more of its methane, and a coalition that includes the Center for Biological Diversity wants the state to do more than fine the mine and to order it to install the best available control technology.

Schendler, a former sustainability executive at Aspen Skiing Company, is one of three owners of the Bowie No. 1 mine above Paonia. Years ago, he said, he and two partners asked West Elk whether it wanted to flare its methane, and it didn't, so they turned to the nearby Elk Creek mine instead. When uncombusted methane is being released into our atmosphere, from a Climate Change perspective, "The best thing you can do is take a BIC lighter and set it on fire," Schendler said.

West Elk is a big employer in the North Fork Valley. Its parent company, Core Natural Resources, didn't return the Sun's messages, and as of publication it hadn't answered an email KVNF sent on Sept. 29. Booth said the fossil fuel industry generally argues that too many controls can make a mine no longer economically viable. Schendler said West Elk's workers "are good people and hard workers and they need those jobs, but they should be safe and they should be in an organization that's well managed," and noted that "in their defense, they self-reported these violations."

The Air Pollution Control Division told the Sun it can't answer questions about an ongoing legal process, and it hasn't said when its investigation will be done. "Our full investigation could identify additional alleged violations and result in an additional compliance advisory," spokesperson Kate Malloy said in a statement. "If you plug a hole, you're going to plug both VOCs and methane," Booth said.