DEP Meeting to Address Plan for Consol Mines
Washington PA Observer-Reporter
13 February 2010
By Bob Niedbala, Staff writer
niedbala@observer-reporter.com
The state Department of Environmental Protection will hold a meeting on
a permit revision requested by Consol Energy Inc. to construct a new
pipeline to connect mine pools between its closed Blacksville No. 1 and
Humphrey mines.
The informal public conference will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. Feb. 23 at
Wayne Township Municipal Building in Spraggs.
The proposed revision to the Blacksville No. 1 Mine's refuse area
permit calls for constructing a 6-inch pipeline connecting the two mine
pools for the purpose of water treatment, according to the public
notice. The line will be installed at a depth of 3.5 feet from the
surface.
DEP spokeswoman Helen Humphreys said the project will involve upgrading
an existing pipeline now being used to transport water from the
Blacksville No. 1 Mine pool to the Humphrey Mine pool.
"They have an existing line and they are upgrading it in order to be
more efficient in delivering more water from Blacksville No. 1 to
Humphrey," Humphreys said.
Concerns were earlier raised about water in the Blacksville No. 1 Mine
pool because of a permitted coal bed methane brine disposal well at the
mine's Morris Run Shaft, or borehole, in Greene County.
CNX Gas Co., which has a permit to operate the well from the federal
Environmental Protection Agency, was cited by EPA this summer for
allegedly failing to adequately secure the well site and monitor the
well's cumulative volume.
Humphreys said, however, the Morris Run borehole is about three miles
"down gradient" from the area where water will be piped from
Blacksville to Humphrey. "It's unlikely that water that was dumped into
the Morris Run borehole will be transported to Humphrey," she said.
Some water from the Humphrey pool is now pumped into the Shannopin Mine
pool and is then treated at AMD Reclamation Inc.'s Steele Shaft
treatment plant, Humphreys said.
Consol also treats water in the Humphrey Mine pool by pumping it to
treatment plants for its Arkwright Mine in West Virginia, the company
said earlier.
The Steele Shaft plant, which discharges into Dunkard Creek, treats
only for acidity and for certain metals associated with acid mine
drainage, but not for chloride and total dissolved solids, Humphreys
said.
Chlorides and total dissolved solids have been linked to the growth of
algae that led to a massive fish kill in Dunkard Creek upstream from
the Steele Shaft in September.
Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future and Friends of Dunkard Creek last
month filed an appeal challenging a permit amendment granted by DEP
allowing the Steele Shaft to take additional water from the Humphrey
mine pool without treating it for total dissolved solids and other
pollutants.
Kurt Weist, PennFuture attorney, said Friday that his organization is
concerned about the quality of the water that is coming out of
Blacksville No. 1 mine pool, regardless of possible further
contamination by the Morris Run borehole.
In CNX's application for the disposal well the company noted that
existing water in the Blacksville No. 1 Mine was "brackish" and high in
chloride, he said.
If the Blacksville No. 1 mine water is pumped to Humphrey and is then
treated at Steele Shaft, there is a problem because that plant cannot
treat for chlorides or totals dissolved solids, Weist said.
Weist said he questions why this is being done and if DEP has a "big
picture" regarding what is being done to treat polluted water in the
area's mine pools.
Consol spokesman Joe Cerenzia, reached Friday afternoon, said the
company needs to upgrade the existing line between the two pools.