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<br />SITE DESCRIPTION EXHIBIT B <br />• 1. Location and General Environmental Information <br />The site is located at 5700' elevation, 11.0 miles west of Meeker, immediately south of Highway 64. <br />The site is south of a'/ mile bend in the White River immediately downstream of where Piceance <br />Creek enters the River. Access to the site from Highway 64 is south on the paved Piceance Creek <br />Road a distance of approximately 8000 feet to a left turn on a graveled access road through BLM <br />property. From this turn, the permit area is approximately 6000 feet to the northwest. The road ends <br />at the Box Elder Holding Company Ranch. Map A-3 shows the site in relation to the road accesses. <br />BLM has granted right of way access through its two parcels shown on Map A-3. This approval is <br />included in Appendix D. The site and the surrounding area is fairly remote and the only structures <br />within the vicinity are the ranch buildings of Box Elder Holding Co., which are located approxi- <br />mately 5000 feet east of the permit area. The site itself is located on a meadow approximately 4 to 6 <br />feet vertically above the White River. The majority of the permit area is within the 100 year <br />floodplain of the River. According to the landowner, [he site was leveled years ago by bulldozer to <br />facilitate irrigation. Since that time, the site has been irrigated for hay production. Immediately north <br />• of the permit area is a wetland that will be avoided for this operation. <br />2. Site Geoloev <br />The site will mine a sand and gravel deposit which is a alluvium of the recent period of Quaternary <br />age. The alluvium is relatively shallow (less than ZS feet thick) and is underlain by the sandstones, <br />siltstones and mudstones of the Wasatch Formation. These sedimentary layers were formed when <br />uplifting Rocky Mountains to the east blocked eastward drainage during Tertiary time and [he Uinta <br />Mountains blocked northward drainage and a very large lake formed in northwest Colorado, north- <br />east Utah and southwest Wyoming. This lake is referred to as Lake Uinta and it received all the <br />washout material from river floodplains and deltas from the mountains on all sides of the lake. Some <br />of the later muds which entered [he lake became what is now the Green River Shale, which is noted <br />for its oil content. The Green River Shale forms the hills immediately south of the permit area. Lake <br />Uinta lasted for 6,500,000 years until further uplifts drained it. <br />Ir1 <br />L~ <br />Piceance Pit 7/01 3 <br />