GENERAL49575 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

1 CHAPTERTWO Proposed Action and ARernatiues ' When solution mining wells aze no longer needed, American Soda would submit a Sundry Notice to the BLM. The Sundry Notice would outline the protocol for well plugl;ing. 2.2.7.2 Well Field Reclamation As individual solution mining wells are retired, the solution collector pipes and pipe rack serving that well would be removed, and the wells would generally be plugged and abandoned. As sites become inactive, the well pads would be stabilized using suitable techniques (e.g., mulching or annual vegetation) to prevent erosion until final reclamation of all or part of that ;>pecific mining panel. Roads that would not be needed to serve subsequent development within the mining panel would be similazly stabilized. Annual or noxious weeds would be controlled as directed by and in a manner approved by the BLM. American Soda would maintain the capability of making site-specific determinations and implementing site stabilization, maintenance, an~i reclamation activities. These activities would be carried out in consultation with the BLM and CDMG. The timing of initiation of fmal reclamation within a particular mining panel wotdd depend on a number of as-yet undetermined factors discussed below. During final reclamation, all excavations would be backfilled, and disturbed azeas would be graded to confomt to the surrounding terrain or to be consistent with the original pre-mining contours. Fill material would be placed into cuts and over backslopes. No excavations would be left that could trap water or form ponds. All sites would be stabilized using suitable techniques (e.g., mulching or annual vegetation) to prevent erosion until perennial vegetation has become established :and reclamation is complete. Revegetation techniques to be utilized to reclaim the well field aze described in Section 2.2.7.5, below. Development of a typical well field mining panel is illustrated in Figure 2-3. Final reclamation of each mining panel or part of a mining panel can only be accomplished once mining activities in the panel or part of a panel have been concluded. At that point, the solution mining wells would have been properly abandoned, the solution collector pipes and pipe racks would have been removed to serve other azeas, and the well field access roads could be abandoned, as appropriate. However, although a "two-pass" mining sequence for each of the mining panels is envisioned, the specific progression of hole development beyond the first pass rc~ay be adjusted as experience from the first pass yields additional information about rates of cavity growth and about ultimate cavity size. Therefore, the second pass could entail an orderly progression from one end of a mining panel to the other, or the second pass could be accomplished based on site- specific assessments of the status of adjacent wells, which could result in active wells distributed across an entire panel until neaz the very end of the 5-year mining interval. The lbrmer approach might allow final reclamation to commence some time prior to the end of the 5-yeaz mining interval, while the latter approach would only allow initiation of reclamation after neazly all of the solution mining wells in that particulaz panel had been retired. The analysis for this EIS assumes conservatively that the latter situation would prevail and that reclamation of one mining panel would commence at approximately the same tinre as initiation of development of the next mining panel. Therefore, at any one time, the disturbed azea in the well field would roughly approximate the size of one of the mining panels. The ~unount of land that could be substantially disturbed within each of the 5-yeaz mining panels outlined for 2-26