2018 progress at the UBMC

Work at the UBMC has been proceeding rapidly this year, despite getting off to a late start. The plan for this year included a flexible three-section approach that started with a base bid that ensured remediation of Bear Trap Canyon, from the confluence of Mike Horse and Bear Trap Creeks down to the Water Treatment Plant, would be completed this year, at a minimum.

By Aug. 10, the contractor for the project, Missouri River Contractors, had made enough progress that the partner agencies agreed to initiate work on the second section, called Additive Alternative A, which encompassed the first stretch of the Blackfoot River below the Water Treatment Plant.

Project Manager David Bowers said some of the issues they had been concerned about, including a lack of separation between the mine waste and the naturally occurring mineralization in Bear Trap Canyon above the Water Treatment Plant, proved to be less of a concern than expected. He said it meant they didn't have to install a lined wetland system or do the dewatering of the area they had expected.

"That's one of the reasons we just flew through here," he said. "We didn't have to manage the water the way we thought. It's better to be prepared for the worst and then run into some good luck than it is to not be prepared for it and have yourselves in all kinds of a mess."

By taking advantage of that luck, by early September they completed the removal of two cells at the Water Treatment Plant and a short section of contaminated haul road, had finished stream channel diversion and the clearing of vegetation throughou Alternative A, and began hauling waste out of that area.

According to community involvement coordinator Karen Ogden, work on Alternative B, which stretches covers the final stretch of the river down the EE/CA boundary near the Edith mine, began early this month.

According to information provided by Bowers, sofar this year they have removed 151, 366 cubic yards of waste from the Base Bid and Alternative A areas, and are currently working in the concentrated tailings along the river channel in Alternative B, above Shaue Gulch.