Mine discharges dwarf remedies
The abandoned Shannopin Mine in Greene County is rapidly filling with acidic water and, if left unchecked, is expected to blow through its porthole in about 18 months, spewing thousands of gallons a minute into a creek that feeds the Monongahela River.
It is just one of at least 2,000 abandoned and flooding mine pools statewide, discharging polluted water from about 5,000 known points and threatening the health of the state's rivers and waterways.
And more are threatening to overflow.
"The scope of the problem is so huge, and our funding is so small in comparison," said Karl Lasher, state Department of Environmental Protection spokesman.
The state, lacking the $5 billion needed to deal with the problem on its own, is turning to industries for help in cleaning up the polluted water from the Shannopin and other abandoned mines, Lasher said.
The state spent just $10 million between 1998 and 2001 on the problem, some of it from a federal fund slated to evaporate next year.
Those pools are spewing water polluted with acid and metals -- particularly manganese and iron -- into the state's waterways, said Joe Schueck, chief of the division of acid mine drainage abatement in the DEP's bureau of abandoned mine reclamation.
No one knows exactly how vast the problem is. Small and bootleg mines, and the discharges they may have spawned, were never mapped.
To offset the damage caused by polluted waters that the state is not close to containing, the Mining and Reclamation Advisory Board created the Acid Mine Drainage Task Force early this year to form partnerships with industries that had nothing to do with creating the problems.
In a novel business arrangement, the DEP is trying to entice industries into treating the mine water and using it for their needs, such as cooling power plants. The industries could take water from abandoned mines for free.
"It's literally billions of gallons of water that's available for use, provided it's cleaned up," Schueck said.
"It could save the Commonwealth billions of dollars," added David Strong, task force chairman.
Abandoned mines and coal seams act as underground conduits. Fed by rainwater seepage and aquifers, water flows through the cavernous gaps -- collecting metals and acid along the way -- and eventually spills into streams, rivers and lakes. The water can be discharged just about anywhere. It could even burst through a hillside.
Mining companies are required to treat the water before dumping it into the environment, but the state is responsible for mines abandoned by bankrupt or now-defunct companies.
Only about 300 to 400 of the 2,000 abandoned mine pools have large enough amounts of water to be useful to industry, including nearly 50 in southwestern Pennsylvania, Schueck said.
Industries now draw water from the rivers, which creates problems for downstream users during droughts.
DEP officials hope that a readily available supply of water, cheaper land and an available work force in rural areas will help spur industries to develop near the abandoned mine sites and bring some economic resurgence to communities once driven by mining.
"The power sector seems to be the ones that look the most promising right now," Lasher said.
DEP officials are negotiating with at least two companies to help take care of a potentially huge problem in Greene County and may announce a partnership with one as early as this week.
The Shannopin Mine is filling with acid drainage at the rate of more than 12 feet a year and, if nothing is done, is expected to overflow in late 2004 or early 2005.
"The discharge would be very deleterious to Dunkard Creek and Monongahela River," Schueck said.
If that happens, the river and watershed would be significantly polluted, killing aquatic life. The now-working Titus Mine above it would be flooded and inoperable. Already, the mine's operator, Dana Mining Co., had to cease operations at the Dooley Run Mine because of the Shannopin's flooding. The company also is proposing to open the Four West Mine, but that, too, is threatened by the Shannopin.
"It's pretty nasty stuff; it's pretty polluted, and it's flooding into the coal reserves the active mine above it is trying to get to," Lasher said.
Nearby communities are not threatened with flooding, Lasher said. "It would be much more of an environmental problem rather than a threat to a community," he said.
It would cost the state $800,000 to build a water treatment plant near the mine and $1.5 million a year to treat it, Schueck said.
But the Dana Mine still would be flooded, so the company has a stake in pumping out the Shannopin Mine before the water levels threaten its operations, Schueck said. The Shannopin Mine is on the Pittsburgh Coal Seam while Dana's mines are on the Sewickley Coal Seam.
The water would have to be piped up to two miles to be treated and released, he said.
Here's where a third potential partner, Massachusetts-based GenPower LLC, could enter the equation, DEP officials said.
GenPower, which is considering building a power plant just over the state line in West Virginia, needs about 7,000 gallons of clean water every minute to cool the plant, Schueck said.
Company and state officials are discussing plans to pull the water from the Shannopin Mine and five other nearby, abandoned mine pools instead of from the Monongahela River, according to the DEP.
A water treatment plant would be built west of Bobtown along Meadow Run Stream, and the treated water piped about seven miles to the power plant. This apparently would involve a combination of state and corporate funding, but DEP officials would not discuss the specifics.
"That's the type of win-win situation we're looking for," Schueck said.
