Architect to be Hired for Creek Plant
Will treat Deckers’ acid mine pollution
Morgantown Dominion
Post
2 May 2011
By David Beard
The Deckers Creek acid mine drainage cleanup project will soon take
another step forward.
The U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is preparing a
Request For Qualifications to hire an architectural/geotechnical firm
to consult for its proposed Richard Mine treatment plant, said Martin
Christ, water remediation director for Friends of Deckers Creek (FODC).
Plant construction should begin in 2015, he said, and be finished by
2016.
The defunct Richard Mine — closed in 1953 — covers about 3 square
miles, with all but a small portion of it running northeast of Deckers
Creek and W.Va. 7 from Richard, according to a FODC map.
The abandoned mine dumps 300,000 gallons of acid mine drainage —
including 1,000 pounds of metals and more than 1 ton of acidity into
Deckers Creek every day, said FODC Director Sarah Veselka. The drainage
kills aquatic life in the creek’s lower six miles and the metals turn
it red-orange all the way through Morgantown to its mouth at the
Monongahela River.
FODC has been working to clean up Richard Mine for 15 years, she said.
Standing at the creek’s edge at a point in Richard, it’s possible to
see where the mine drains from a culvert and down a manmade trough into
the creek. Christ said that in the 1990s, the Department of
Environmental Protection Abandoned Mine Lands office worked on the
drainage mine, opened and drained it and put in pipes so water wouldn’t
pile up.
In the late 1990s, Christ said, the NRCS decided to put together a
cleanup plan for the whole creek. It completed the plan in 2000, and in
2002 the DEP signed on. They waited until 2006 to tackle the mine — the
toughest part of the project.
Veselka sketched a timeline of the plant plan:
In 2002, the NRCS committed $4.8 million to treat acid discharges in
the Deckers Creek watershed.
In 2002, the DEP committed $4.8 million in matching funds, including
$2.1 million specifically to clean up the Richard mine.
In 2004 and following years, Sen. Robert C. Byrd appropriated funding
for NRCS to realize the plan formalized in 2002.
The NRCS has a design and funds to build the treatment plant, but
cannot, by law, pay for operations and maintenance.
In 2009, FODC succeeded in partnering with the DEP, which agreed to
provide 80 percent of the operations and maintenance funds for 20
years. The city of Morgantown and Monongalia County agreed to be the
local sponsors for the remaining 20 percent.
DEP spokeswoman Kathy Cosco said that “at this point, it’s difficult to
pin down the costs because the final treatment design has not been
completed.”
Rough estimates by DEP staff put the cost around $400,000 a year, she
said, which would mean the DEP would contribute about $6.4 million
during the 20-year period and the local sponsors would contribute about
$1.6 million during the same time period.
These aren’t final numbers, she said. “Things such as inflation and
potential increases in electricity costs could make the costs go up —
or conversely, efficiencies in the plant design could possibly reduce
the costs.”
Morgantown Director of Finance J.R. Sabatelli echoed Cosco’s thoughts.
The city and county inked the agreement in March 2010, he said, but
with no plant built there’s been no financial commitment. That will be
spelled out in a future project agreement.
According to his most recent letter from the NRCS, the NRCS expects
operations to begin around January 2017.
A plant site hasn’t been selected, Christ said. The hired consultant
will help determine that. It will locate the best place to drill into
the mine to extract a sufficient flow of water to treat. Pumping out
too much or too little could create more problems.
The site will require ponds for the solids to settle out. If the area
is big enough, they could use long earthen ponds. On a smaller pad,
they would build vertical tanks.
The ultimate benefits, Christ said, beyond a clean creek, are revived
fishing in the Sabraton area and a possible increase in property values
for lots along the affected segment of the creek. Maybe, down the road,
it could even stimulate new business — creekside restaurants, outdoor
recreation shops and more.
Christ provided a brief history of the mine. It was opened in 1936 as
Industrial Collieries Corp. No. 21 Mine. (References to Industrial
Collieries show it was a Bethlehem Steel subsidiary, and successor to
Bethlehem Mines Corp., which dissolved in 1936 and reformed as
Industrial Collieries.)
Traveling through Richard, you can still see the original, identically
shaped coal camp houses. The tire store once served as the mine
headquarters, then as a school. The janitorial supply store was once
the company store.
The mine closed in 1953.