PERMFILE54123

• Permit No: M1999002
• IBM Index Class Name: Permit File
• Doc Date: 6/18/1999
• Doc Name: OBJECTORS EXHIBITS
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

' ~~oDUCno~ •
" B~d~ rock salt is faemd in :,ie `v'ernon aqd 5}Tacuse Formations of the upper Silurian Salina
group, at depths ranging from d00 to 1,000 feet, under an estimated 8,500-square-mile portion of Nety
York (see Figure I). Rickard (1969) correlated New York's salt beds to the strata mined in Ohio,
Ontario, and Michigan. Netiv }'ork's salt resource has undergone continuous development through both
solution mining and room and pillar mining for over 100 years. Today's methodical and efficient
solution mining operations contrast sharply with the boom-like atmosphere of the state's salt industry in
the late nineteenth century (Sanford, 1996x).
The largest solution mining field in New York was operated in Tully Valley, 20 miles south of
Syracuse, from 1888 until 1958 by Solvay Process Company and its successors. During the century-long
life of the field, 1.4 billion cubic feet of salt--enough to fill the Syracuse University Carrier Dome 35
Mmes--were removed. A4ost activity in Tully Valley took place prior to the implementation in 1973 of
legislative amendments that gave the state jurisdiction over solution mining wells. Upon abandonment
~~J of the Tully Valley brine field in ] 958, none of the wells had been plugged in accordance ~sith the state's
1973 legislation. The Division of Mineral Resources within the Depattment of Environmental
Consen~atton undertook an enforcement initiative that resulted in the plugging of 167 wells between 1959
and 1995. Division staff worked ~+ith the operator, AlliedSignal Corporation, to develop special site-
specific plugging guidelines that acknowledged the poor condition of old, inadequately cemented
l ~vellbores that had been extensively damaged by subsidence.
The Tully Valley is a U-shaped glacial valley with anorth-south orientation, similar to the Finger
Lake valleys further west. Bedrock formations, Devonian in age and older, generally dip to the south
at about 50 to 80 feet per mile. Bedrock is exposed on the valley sides, while the valley itself is filled
y µith up to 500 feet of unconsolidated sediments. 1`lost wells were drilled along the sides of the valley.
The Silurian Syracuse salts mined in Tully Valley are generally found between 900 and 1,200 feet
beneath the surface. The Tully Valley mudboils, studied by Getchell (1953), Kappel, et al (1996) and
others, are located one to one and a half miles north of the brine field. This report focuses on the brine
field itself, not the mudboils.
CURREI\T STATUS OF THE SOLUTIO\ SALT ML\'ING LIDUSTRY )'~' )\E\V YORK
a
Five solution mining facilities, listed in Table 1, are currently active in New York. Wells have
~ been plugged in recent years at t~t•o additional brine fields, listed in Table 2. All seven fields listed in
t the nvo tables are shop+'n on Figure 1.
Akzo Nobel, Cargill and A4orton all produce brine to supply on-site evaporation plants, while
Texas Brine supplies brine via pipeline to two chemical manufacturing plants in Niagara Falls. These
operators reported 2.1 billion gallons of brine ~+i;hdra~'als to the state's Division of 1\3ineral Resources
for 199. Total annual ~~ithdra~val reported for these facilities has increz<ed 25% since 1956 (Briggs,
1996)
Solution mining operators in Ness York currently use the modem cavern development techniques
of hydrofracturing, horizontal drilling, and controlled roof padding summarized by Sanford (1996x).
These operators also routinely exceed regularon completion requirements by cementing all ~~•ellbore
-, ca_cing strives from the base of the casing to the surface, as well as exceeding plugging requirements b}'
2
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