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West Elk Mine <br />:. mentioned 38,000 gallons for domestic use would be primarily non-consumptive use and returned <br />to the river following treatment. <br />The remaining 162,000 gallons per day of water use is for coal spraying and dust suppression <br />activities. The estimate is conservative and includes a 15 percent contingency for leakage. <br />Consumptive use is difficult to estimate, but should be less than 85 percent. The return flow <br />would be collected and routed to sediment pond MB-1. This water is then treated and either <br />released to the North Fork or recycled. Assuming 138,000 gal/day (0.2 cfs) is the consumptive <br />use, only about 1 percent of the lowest flow on record would be consumed. However, even this <br />magnitude does not represent the true picture of risk of affecting water supplies to downstream <br />AVF's. Because of Mountain Coal Company's junior water rights, most of the water supply will <br />be withdrawn during spring runoff and stored for mine use. Thus, it is quite possible that during <br />the irrigation season the mine could be a net water producer. Given current mazket conditions, it <br />is unlikely that West Elk will achieve a maximum coal production rate of 2.8 MMTPY any time <br />in the foreseeable future. Thus water withdrawn and discharged into the North Fork of the <br />Gunnison River from the mine will be significantly less than originally predicted and the impacts <br />to the North Fork AVF much less than discussed here. <br />• <br /> <br />2.06-10 <br />