OFFICE OF SURFACE MINING
For Release  January 9, 1990
Alan Cole (202) 343-4719

O.S.M. EMBLEM REPRESENTS ENVIRONMENTAL BALANCE

The Interior Department's Office of Surface Mining (OSM) has
adopted a new official emblem that symbolizes balance between the
country's need for coal to supply energy and the national need for
environmental protection.

OSM Director Harry M. Snyder said the new emblem, which will be
used as an organizational logo, represents the agency's commitment
to balanced policies and a fair, even-handed way of carrying them
out.

"America's mining technology is able to produce the coal we need
without permanent impact on.the environment," Snyder said.  "With
environmental controls during mining and land reclamation
afterward, coal can be mined while people and the environment are
protected.  That's the kind of balance the new emblem stands for."

"We don't have to choose between environmental quality and energy
sufficiency," Snyder said.  "We can have both."

The new OSM emblem is a circular design with a balance scale
inside. One of the scale's balance pans holds conifer trees,
representing the environment.  The other, representing mining,
contains a pile of coal.  The two pans are poised equally.

Below the scale are curved bands of green (representing topsoil),
white (representing subsoil and rock overburden) and black
(representing coal). The low point of the curve is filled in with
blue waves (representing water resources).

Atop the scale is a federal eagle, signifying the federal
regulatory program which the coal mining states carry out, mandated
by Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977, which
created OSM.

The new design will be used as the official agency logo on
uniforms, vehicles, and office signs.  The old emblem, which
features a bulldozer blade, is being phased out.

EDITORS & CORRESPONDENTS: A black-and-white copy of the new OSM
logo is attached.