Toxics Cleanup Program     |     Abandoned Mine Lands Initiative  

What do we currently know about AML sites in Washington?

In 1956, Marshall Huntting completed what appears to be the first comprehensive inventory of mines in the state; i.e., Bulletin 37.  This effort identified ~4000 properties and included some very basic descriptive information:  Township, Range, and Section; County; alternate names, and the like.  No environmental information was included in this effort.  Subsequent to that, around 1998, the US Bureau of Mines created the Mineral Availability/Mineral Industry Location system known as “MAS/MILS.”  This effort refined the universe of knowledge regarding mines in Washington by simply adding in more accurate location information and details regarding what kind of mine it was; i.e., surface, placer, underground, prospect, etc.  Shortly after this, another effort was undertaken by the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to narrow the field of interest down from the 4000 sites described by both Huntting and the US Bureau of Mines.  A very simple screening of properties known to have produced more than $1000 worth of ore was conducted and resulted in the identification of 541 sites.  This subset appears to form a reasonable starting point regarding AML sites in Washington that are in need of immediate assessment.

Cleanups in Washington are, in most cases, accomplished under the authority of the Model Toxics Control Act (MTCA)[1].   Under this authority the Program is presently involved with AML cleanups at various sites including but not limited to the Kabba Texas Mine, the Upper Columbia River efforts, the Holden Mine, the Coeur d'Alene Basin, and the Alder Mine/Mill to name a few.  The scope and scale of these cleanups range from relatively easy relocation of tailings into environmentally safe repositories to the much more complicated construction and operation of water treatment facilities designed to manage acid mine drainage for a hundred or more years.