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Executive Summary Cultural and Paleontological Resources. All three action alternatives would have similar impacts. Twenty potentially significant prehistoric sites are located at the Piceance Site and may be adversely affected directly by construction or indirectly by surface collecting. Pipeline construction would not affect significant cultural resources, as long as one site is avoided. No known Native American traditional use or religious azeas would be affected. All construction activities in the lease area and pipeline corridor, except in Quaternary alluvium, would be inventoried/monitored for fossil resources. Development of the Parachute Site would have no effects on any known significant cultural or paleontological resources. A Programmatic Agreement is being prepazed among the BLM, State Historic Preservation Officer, American Council on Historic Preservation, and American Soda. Two major requirements of the Programmatic Agreement aze that BLM ensure that American Soda (1) conducts appropriate cultural resources inventories for the project, and (2) develops a Cultural Resource Treatment Plan to avoid, mitigate or min;mize impacts. Land Use and Recreation. Impacts would be similar for all three action alternatives. The project would be in compliance with BLM, Rio Blanco County, and Garfield County land use plans. For the BLM Ryan Gulch Area of Environmental Concern (ACEC), mitigation to avoid impacts to federally protected plant species would be necessary for the project to be within BLM land use guidelines. Most of the Piceance Site would still be available for hunting and public access. The numbers of deer and the quality of the surroundings would be diminished by the industrial activities, but regional impacts on hunting would not be significant. Grazing losses would be minimal and would not require an adjustment to grazing permits. Pipeline construction would cause short-term disruption of farming practices and would temporarily interfere with irrigation ditches and the application of water to irrigated hay meadows. Hay production would be reduced slightly for at least 2 years until vegetation recovers. Visual Resources. The physical alteration of the existing landscape under all three action alternatives would be substantial in portions of the Piceance Site and would change the existing natural landscape to an industrial site. Impacts would be greater for the Accelerated Development Alternative because of larger azeas under active mining. Long-term (life of project) changes would be confined to certain facilities, and active mining areas would be reclaimed as mining in each panel is completed. The visibility of these changes would vary according to viewer location and orientation, Views from Piceance Creek Road would mostly be screened by topography and vegetation, but travelers on the Yellow Creek Jeep Trail would experience close exposure to project facilities. The project would meet the visual resource guidelines for Visual Resource Management (VRM) Class III lands. However, the mining activities, as proposed, would likely exceed the guidelines for visual resource management in the Ryan Gulch ACEC. Areas impacted by mining activities would be reclassified to VRM Class V, which is a classification given to areas needing rehabilitation. This is an interim classification until reclamation results in a higher VRM objective to be met. The pipeline corridor would largely follow existing pipelines and would look the same or would be located in azeas that aze screened from view or have poor or no public access. The Parachute Site would not experience substantial visual change. However, the Agency Preferred Alternative would reduce impacts due to elimination of the cooling towers and reduction of off-site glare at night. ES-7