HomeMy WebLinkAboutHealthy River Board - Methane in Coal Basin
Pitkin County Healthy Rivers
530 East Main Street Suite 301
Aspen Colorado 81611
970 920 5191 office
970 309 2139 cell
pitkincountyrivers.com
LETTER FROM HEALTHY RIVERS BOARD TO THE PITKIN COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS regarding: Coal Basin Methane Project.
The Healthy Rivers Board (HRSB) understands the Pitkin County Board of County Commissioner’s (BOCC) support of the effort to reduce methane emissions into the atmosphere from abandoned coal mines in upper Coal Basin. We hope the proposed project’s efforts to help address the area’s unfortunate contribution to Global Warming are successful.
The bylaws of our Board and ballot language compel us to not only engage with the community, but to comment to other departments in Pitkin County to assist them in meeting voter approved Healthy River’s goals. The first listed goal is to maintain and improve water quality, and we encourage the BOCC to make appropriate comments to the Forest Service to ensure this methane
project results in no damage to Coal Creek and the Crystal River.
Past mining in the Basin was done from five portals, accessed by miles of unpaved haul roads bulldozed across crumbling, erodible Mancos shale. The result, according to past Roaring Fork Conservancy employee Sharon Clarke was that Coal Basin was the greatest contributor of
sediments in the Roaring Fork Drainage.
Use of the eastern part of the original mine operation is planned for the proposed methane capture and destroy project, most of which would be on Whiter River National Forest (WRNF) land. The Healthy Rivers Board is concerned about potential water quality impacts associated
with the opening of long, unpaved mine access roads, which if reopened and used for truck and
vehicle travel, would create a water quality problem in Coal Creek potentially undoing years of reclamation efforts. Any impacts to Coal Creek would be delivered to the Crystal River. The Board has similar concerns in the areas surrounding reopened mine portals where earth moving and mine sealing operations will be undertaken to perform the methane testing and eroding soils
could again become a problem.
After the major mine reclamation project which was completed in 2000, game warden John Seidel once said that as a result of the erosion load washed into the Crystal River from Coal Creek, there were no fish reproducing on the main stem of the Crystal River downstream from its
confluence with Coal Creek. Now there are healthy trout in both streams, thanks to expensive
and extensive reclamation activities. The mines shut down in 1992 and in 1995 reclamation was undertaken by state and federal agencies, and then more by the Forest Service in 2014. The Healthy Rivers Board is concerned that in the application to the WRNF to proceed with the
methane project (federal Form 299 dated 5/14/22), the applicant made no mention of erosion
control or water quality. To date, the WRNF has not decided on the level of environmental review under NEPA, but public comments will be important no matter their decision. The HRSB
Pitkin County Healthy Rivers
530 East Main Street Suite 301
Aspen Colorado 81611
970 920 5191 office
970 309 2139 cell
pitkincountyrivers.com recommends Pitkin County comments to the Forest Service ask the agency to require the
proposed Methane Project be conducted in a manner that minimizes activities that increase erosion, requires state-of-the-art erosion control practices, and maintains or even improves water quality in Coal Creek.
Thank you,
Chris Lemons, Chair