Montana environmentalists were displeased with the Army Corps’ work, arguing that the EIS completely ignored the environmental impacts in Montana related to increased coal shipments.

“We definitely don’t think of this as a good thing for Montana. There is a 60-day comment period, and we will be commenting,” said Kate French, chairwoman of the Billings-based Northern Plains Resource Council. “It’s rather surprising that (the report) would seem favorable because five of six coal port terminals have been rejected or dropped because they’re either undue burdens on communities or there’s no market for coal abroad. Increasingly, there’s no market in the U.S. for coal.”

Economically, coal is on the ropes, under-priced by natural gas and increasingly facing tougher pollution standards as the United States and other nations react to climate change by imposing restrictions on greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide.