1995-01-17_HYDROLOGY - M1977378

• Permit No: M1977378
• IBM Index Class Name: HYDROLOGY
• Doc Date: 1/17/1995
• Doc Name: Voluntary Mitigation Assumptions and Position.
• From: Sunnyside Gold Corp
• To: CDPHE-WQCD
• Permit Index Doc Type: Hydrology Report
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

AL
St?NNYSIDE GOLD CORPORATION
AN ECX0 8AY COMPANY
P.O. Box 177 .Silverton, CO 81433
Phone [phone] -Telecopy [phone]
Assumptions of Sunnyside Gold Concerning Contemplated Voluntary
Cleanup Activities
Upper Animas River Basin, Colorado
DATE: January 12, 1995
1. Proposals for voluntary cleanup are part of a privileged and
private settlement negotiation between Sunnyside Gold
Corporation ("SGC" ) and the Water Quality Control Division of
the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment
("WQCD") . This discussion is being entered into to resolve
issues that gave rise to the lawsuit captioned Sunnyside Gold
Corporation v. Colorado Water Quality Control Division,
Colorado Department of Health, Civil Action No. 94CV 5459.
2. The Sunnyside Mine represents a technically sound place to use
hydraulic seals to effect mine closure as part of final
reclamation. SGC and state agencies believe that plugging of
the Sunnyside Mine is the best and most technically feasible
approach to ending drainage from the mine, as part of the
overall plan for final reclamation.
3 . Placement of the main hydraulic seal within the American
Tunnel will result in the filling of the mine workings over a
period of time. This will eventually reverse the artificial
hydrological conditions that currently exist within the
mountain, and return the groundwater flow regime within the
mountain to nearly natural conditions. Sealing and flooding
the mine may have effects that include, but are not limited
to, the eventual migration to the surface of water from the
filled mine pool as pool water becomes part of the
hydrological regime, and changes in f low of natural seeps and
springs as water that formerly flowed into the cone of
depression of the mine and out the American Tunnel resumes its
natural flow paths around the mine. Voluntary cleanup
activities undertaken by SGC as a result of this negotiation
will be deemed to be mitigation for potential effects of SGC's
reclamation of the Sunnyside Mine by sealing and flooding its
workings.
a. Once a program of voluntary cleanup is agreed
upon, adopted, and carried out as agreed upon by the
parties, WQCD will consider effects resulting from
plugging of the Sunnyside Mine to have been mitigated,
and will refrain from citing or prosecuting SGC, its
parent, agents, officers, directors or employees in the
event such effects are detected.