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Section 1.0 Industrial Activity Description <br />The Natural Soda, Inc. (NSI) mine is located near the depositional center of the Piceance Creek <br />Basin, which contains bedded and disseminated saline minerals and oil shale. NSI currently <br />recovers nahcolite (sodium bicarbonate) by in -situ solution mining of the Boies Bed, a bedded <br />nahcolite interval near the top of the Saline Zone and within tens of feet of the Dissolution <br />Surface (DS), and bounded on the bottom by the top of the R -5 oil shale zone. In 2012 NSI <br />began mining the disseminated nahcolite existing below the Lower Salt and between the <br />approximate depths of 2,300 and 2,900 feet. Hot unsaturated (barren) brine dissolves the <br />nahcolite as it circulates through the Boies Bed stratiform interval. The "pregnant" nahcolite <br />solution is recovered from the cavity and routed to the process plant via a surface pipeline. An <br />electric submersible pump is used for fluid recovery. Heat exchangers and crystallizers in the <br />process plant cool the pregnant solution causing the dissolved nahcolite to precipitate as sodium <br />bicarbonate crystals. The bicarbonate crystals are de- watered, dried, classified, packaged and <br />shipped to market from this facility. After crystallization of the pregnant solution, the remaining, <br />now barren, brine is reheated and returned to the cavities forming a continuous, closed circuit <br />process or discharged into the process /waste pond to be evaporated. <br />The dry product (pure sodium bicarbonate of various crystal sizes) is either bagged and stored in <br />the load out bay or transported by conveyor to the silo for bulk storage. The product is very pure <br />and meets standards for use in the medical, food, industrial, as well as the animal feed industries. <br />NSI established a mining panel concept with the initial development of the Boies Bed resource. <br />Mine panels are approximately 500 -800 feet wide and up to 3,000 feet in length (approximately <br />55 acres). Combinations of both vertical and directionally - drilled horizontal production and /or <br />injection wells have been employed to recover saline minerals in the panels. In addition, <br />currently unknown mining methods and technological advances may be identified and employed <br />in the future. <br />The areas of the NSI Lease in which potential pollutants may be present within stormwater <br />discharges include the vicinity of the processing plant, along the trace of the surface pipelines, <br />and on or adjacent to existing well pads. Existing structural control measures to control and <br />maintain stormwater discharge is discussed below. Figure 1 is a site map displaying the <br />locations of the processing plant and the existing well field for solution mining operations, as <br />well as the existing drainages. Figure 2 is a site map of the NSI processing plant and associated <br />structures, structural control measures, and potential outfalls. <br />Daub & Associates, Inc. NSI 2011 SWMP <br />Page 1 <br />