West Virginia Code Chapter 22. Environmental Resources § 22-9-4. Notice by persons operating coal mines

(a) Any person owning or operating a coal mine on the eighth day of June, one thousand nine hundred fifty-five, and having knowledge that it overlies or is within two thousand linear feet of a gas storage reservoir, shall within thirty days notify the director and the storage operator of such fact unless such notification has already been provided to the director pursuant to the provisions of former article four, chapter twenty-two-b of this code.

(b) When any person owning or operating a coal mine hereafter expects that within the ensuing nine-month period such coal mine will be extended to a point which will be within two thousand linear feet of any storage reservoir, such person shall notify the director and the storage operator in writing of such fact.

(c) Any person hereafter intending to establish or reestablish an operating coal mine which when established or reestablished will be over a storage reservoir or within two thousand linear feet of a storage reservoir, or which upon being established or reestablished may within nine months thereafter be expected to be within two thousand linear feet of a storage reservoir, shall notify the director and the storage operator in writing before doing so and such notice shall include the date on which it is intended the operating coal mine will be established or reestablished.

Any person who serves such notice of an intention to establish or reestablish an operating coal mine under this subsection, without intending in good faith to establish or reestablish such mine, shall be liable for continuing damages to any storage operator injured by the serving of such improper notice and shall be guilty of a misdemeanor under this article and subject to the same penalties as set forth in section twelve of this article.