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• SECTION 1 OVERVIEW This report presents the engineering basis for a plan of augmentation for the Mount Gunnison Number 1 Coal Kline, which is located in Gunnison County, Colorado. The mine is operated by the West Elk Coal Company (WECC), a subsidiary of Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO), The proposed coal mining operations addressed in this plan, will extend under two tributaries of ' Minnesota Creek, namely the Dry Fork and Lick Creek basins. It is expected that there will be some land subsidence due to the retreat mining operations; with subsidence, there may be a potential for temporarily ' depleting the flows of Dry Fork and Lick Creek and thus depleting the natural flow of Minnesota Creek. w The proposed augmentation plan sets up a methodology to identify such stream ~. depletions which may be caused by the retreat mining operations, and ~ establishes compensation for such injury to vested water rights, by use of one or more of the many water rights controlled by WECC in the Minnesota Creek basin. ' The basic principle of the proposed plan is to augment Minnesota Greek, when necessary, so that the flows delivered to valid Calling priorities on ' Minnesota Creek in the future will not be diminished from historical entitlement, Figure 1, on Page 2, is a map showing the Minnesota Creek basin and the area ' to be mined. Map 1, located at the back of the report, identifies the location of the principal decreed water rights in the Minnesota Creek basin, and gaging stations. Of the approximately 17,000 acre feet (AF) of water available annually in ' Minnesota Creek at the Turner headgate (one mile upstream from the Minnesota Canal headgate), approximately 8 percent of the water is derived from the -~ Dry Fork and Lick Creek tributary basins. Only those two basins may eventually be underlain by the Mt. Gunnison coal mine. 1