CHEYENNE, Wyo. — Environmental groups last week took their legal fight to rein in carbon dioxide produced from burning Wyoming coal to a new agency, the U.S. Forest Service. 

Their effort is directed at the potential expansion of a mine served by both the Union Pacific and BNSF Railway, and from which comes fuel for the Laramie River Station, a generating plant that is owned in part by Lincoln Electric System.

The Forest Service oversees national grasslands and in October signed off on expansion of the North Antelope Rochelle Mine farther into the Thunder Basin National Grassland. The surface coal mine there is among the world’s largest. MORE …