U.S. Department of the Interior - U.S. Geological Survey
NUMBER 4, December 1995
The information on this website is for administrative use only.
It should not be quoted or cited as a publication.
[The following paper appears in the
"Workshop Report - Mine Waste Technical Forum".
The workshop was sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
and was held in Las Vegas, Nevada on July 25-27, 1994. For more
information on the workshop, please contact Ken Sala, 202-260-8934]
RESPONSIBILITIES AND ACTIVITIES OF THE U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
RELATED TO MINING AND THE ENVIRONMENT
Charles N. Alpers
U.S. Geological Survey, Sacramento, California
ABSTRACT
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), a bureau of the U.S.
Department of the Interior, is engaged in numerous investigations
related to mining and its effects on the environment. The primary
responsibility of the USGS with regard to mining-environment
research is to provide the nation with reliable and impartial
scientific information on geologic and hydrologic processes
affecting mineral deposits, mined lands, and water quality.
Much of this USGS work is funded directly by Congress; however, a
significant portion is funded by cooperative agreements with
other federal, state, and local agencies and with American Indian
tribes. USGS activities involving mining and the environment
include:
- Regional assessments: Two USGS programs conduct
regional assessments. The Mineral Resource Surveys
Program (MRSP) provides mineral-resource and
mineral-environmental information to guide land-use,
environmental, and mineral-supply decisions of other
agencies, including the Bureau of Land Management and
the U.S. Forest Service. The National Water Quality
Assessment (NAWQA) program describes the status of and
trends in the quality of the nation's surface- and
ground- water resources; several NAWQA study units
address the biogeochemical aspects of water quality
problems related to acid mine drainage.
- Inventory and prioritization: Inventory and
prioritization work on abandoned and inactive mine
lands is facilitated by USGS databases containing
comprehensive information on mineral deposits, coal
deposits, water quality, and the geochemistry of rocks,
soil, stream sediments, and biota.
- Site characterization: Numerous studies involve site
characterization to determine baseline and background
conditions, the environmental impacts of mineral and
energy development, the sources and effects of
mining-related contamination, and the likely environmental
consequences of proposed remedial actions.
- Monitoring and analysis: Monitoring and analysis
activities include development of field and laboratory
methods for conducting geochemical and geophysical
surveys and for spatial and temporal watershed studies,
which are essential to the evaluation of remediation
success and failure.
- Process-oriented studies of contaminant origin,
transport, and fate: These studies are conducted as
part of the Toxic Substances Hydrology Program. Field
sites include long-term research at several mining
districts, including Globe-Miami, Arizona; Iron
Mountain, California; Leadville, Silverton, and
Summitville, Colorado; Couer d'Alene, Idaho; Tar Creek,
Oklahoma; and Lead, South Dakota. An important aspect
of USGS research is the continuing development of
widely used hydrologic and geochemical models, which
are needed for site characterization and for evaluation
of proposed remedial actions prior to implementation.
INTRODUCTION
Metals contribute to our standard of living and our national
security. Precious, industrial, and strategic metals have been
extracted from uncounted mines in many parts of the United
States. This legacy of mining has left metal-rich mine wastes
that produce acidic drainage that affects the quality of water in
many streams throughout the United States and in many other
countries of the world. The effects of mine drainage, which are
seen nationwide, are often severe in mountain headwater streams
and can limit recreational, industrial, and municipal use of
larger rivers many miles downstream from mining. More than
500,000 inactive and abandoned hard rock mines are estimated to
exist in 32 states, with at least 50 billion tons of untreated,
unreclaimed mining waste on private and public land. The
possible cost of cleaning up environmental problems at these
sites could exceed $70 billion. Scientific information that
makes cleanup easier or less expensive would obviously benefit
everyone.
Regulatory decisions about remediation of mining discharge must
be made with the best possible information and understanding
about the problems involved. In response to the need for
information, the USGS, a bureau of the U.S. Department of the
Interior, is engaged in numerous investigations related to mining
and the environment. The primary responsibility of the USGS with
regard to mining and the environment is to provide the nation
with reliable and impartial scientific information on geologic
and hydrologic processes affecting mineral deposits, mined lands,
and water quality. These studies benefit the state and federal
agencies that must make decisions about land management, the
industries that are often responsible for costs, and everyone who
shares concern about the environment.
The mission of the USGS is as follows:
The U.S. Geological Survey provides the Nation with reliable
and impartial information needed to describe and understand
the Earth. USGS information supports decisions that will:
- mitigate losses resulting from natural hazards;
- help manage the Nation's water, energy, and mineral resources;
- enhance and protect the quality of the environment;
and
- contribute to the Nation's economic and physical
development,
thereby improving the safety, health, and well-being of the
people.
Mining-environment issues relate closely to several themes in the
USGS mission, including mineral resources, environmental quality,
and economic development.
The USGS activities on mining and the environment include: 1)
regional assessments, 2) inventory and prioritization, 3) site
characterization, 4) monitoring and analysis, and 5) process-oriented
studies of contaminant origin, transport, and fate. The
purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of these
activities, highlighting examples of recently completed and
ongoing projects. In addition, points of contact are provided
for USGS programs related to mining and the environment to
facilitate communication and promote collaboration between the
USGS and other organizations, including the federal, state,
regional, and local agencies responsible for land management,
regulation, and scientific studies.
GENERAL APPROACH: RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE USGS AND THE USBM
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the U.S. Bureau of Mines
(USBM) work in partnership within the Department of the Interior
assisting land-management and regulatory agencies to inventory,
prioritize, and reduce the costs of remediating mine sites, and
to minimize the environmental hazards that may result from future
development of mineral resources. In September 1994, the
directors of the USGS and USBM signed a memorandum of agreement
(MOA) that establishes a framework for this partnership on mining
and the environment. The USGS-USBM MOA defines the complementary
roles of the two bureaus in a "coordinated, comprehensive
approach to environmental assessment, technology development, and
remedial investigations related to mineral deposits, mining and
associated hazardous waste sites."
The USGS's general approach to mining-environment problems is to
conduct scientific investigations designed to improve the
understanding of relevant geologic, hydrologic, and chemical
processes. Research and development by the USGS includes
"...basic and applied research on natural and human-induced
environmental effects associated with mineral resources." In its
complementary role to the USGS, the USBM "...applies scientific
information from the physical, biological, and earth sciences to
develop and demonstrate engineering solutions to...prevent and
control contaminants... around mineral production sites and to
remediate mineral- and metal-contaminated hazardous waste sites."
Some research areas that the USGS is currently emphasizing are:
1) field and laboratory studies on element mobility within
mineral deposits and the surrounding environment, 2) new methods
to define background and baseline conditions, 3) conceptual
environmental models of mineral deposits and element distribution
in various climatic settings, and 4) quantitative models of
contaminant transport in surface and ground waters.
REGIONAL ASSESSMENTS
USGS conduct two national programs that address mining-environment
issues on a regional scale: the Mineral Resource
Surveys Program (MRSP) and the National Water-Quality Assessment
(NAWQA) program.
Mineral Resource Surveys Program
The MRSP is concerned with gathering and disseminating mineral-resource
and mineral-environmental information for land-use,
environmental and mineral-supply decisions. Principal
cooperation is with federal land management agencies, including
the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), the National Park Service
(NPS), and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS). MRSP activities are
conducted under four issue-related subprograms:
- Assessments are a high priority in the western region
of the country, where most of the federal lands and
non-coal mine sites are located. About one-third of the
nation, 740 million acres, is federal land. Federal
land management agencies are required by law to
consider mineral resource values that may be present on
federal lands when they develop land management plans,
sell or exchange federal lands, and evaluate wilderness
potential. Integrated mineral-resource and mineral-environmental
assessments provide information on known
mineral resources, determine the potential for new
mineral deposits, and evaluate present and predicted
effects resulting from mineral-resource development.
- Mitigation studies determine geochemical baselines and
backgrounds (pre-mining conditions), document human-induced
processes that result in environmental
problems, and suggest methods for mitigation or
remediation. USGS scientists work cooperatively or in
partnership with biologists, botanists, soil
scientists, hydrologists, and other researchers at
state and federal agencies. For example, the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Office of
Surface Mining, and the State of Colorado requested
that the USGS provide information on the geologic
framework and environmental geology of the Summitville
Mine for use in preparing environmental modeling and
predictive studies related to remediation efforts.
These studies benefit the nation by reducing the cost
of remediation and minimizing future contamination.
- Resource investigations, often performed in cooperation
with industry or international agencies, provide
innovative data and interpretations to government and
industry concerning unconventional mineral deposits and
new frontiers of mineral-resource potential. This
information can be used to formulate mineral-resource
policies for maintaining reliable, cost-effective
supplies of mineral materials, to improve assessment
capabilities, and to assist industry in the discovery
and development of new mineral resources.
- Mineral-related information acquired by the USGS over
more than 100 years is available in paper and
electronic forms, including maps, reports, databases,
geographic information systems (GIS), models,
interpretations, and assessments. Much of the
information is contained in two databases: the Mineral
Resources Data System (MRDS) and the National
Geochemical Database (NGDB). These databases are
described in more detail in the "Inventory and
Prioritization" section of this paper.
National Water-Quality Assessment Program
The purpose of the NAWQA program is to demonstrate the status and
trends in quality of the nation's surface and ground waters.
NAWQA began as a pilot program in the late 1980s and was
implemented as a national program during fiscal year (FY) 1991
with 20 study units, each consisting of a large watershed. An
additional 15 study units began their assessments during FY 1994,
and 15 to 20 additional study units are scheduled to begin in FY
1997. When fully implemented, the NAWQA program will have
assessed the long-term trends in water quality affecting about 60
to 70 percent of the nation's surface- and ground-water
resources.
Of the 35 active NAWQA study units, several involve areas with
severe mine drainage impacts. For example, the Sacramento Valley
NAWQA study unit in northern California includes surface waters
affected by acidic metal-rich drainage from Iron Mountain Mine,
an EPA Superfund site. Studies of metal transport in the
Sacramento River using natural tracers such as lead isotopes will
determine the relative metal contributions from mining,
agriculture, and urban sources. Another NAWQA study unit with
mining impacts is the Rio Grande Valley in Colorado, New Mexico,
and Texas, where metal transport and bioaccumulation in mosses
has been studied.
INVENTORY AND PRIORITIZATION
Numerous federal, state, and local agencies are concerned with
conducting inventories of inactive and abandoned mine sites, and
with prioritization of these sites for remediation. The USGS
maintains several databases that can be very useful resources for
inventory and prioritization activities.
MRDS contains more than 110,000 records of mineralized sites or
areas. Each record pertains to a location, which usually
represents a single deposit or mine. Data for each record is
stored in approximately 200 data fields, which include
information on location; geology; descriptions of mine workings;
history of exploration, development, and production; reserves and
resources; and references. Records are available for about 150
mineral commodities, from abrasives to zinc. Complete records or
selected fields can be sorted, indexed, and viewed, downloaded to
files compatible with a GIS, or printed. Plots of site locations
can be made at standard scales or customized to suit the user's
needs. Data from MRDS have been used as a starting point for a
number of inventories of abandoned and inactive mine lands,
including work by the State of Montana, the BLM, and the USFS.
NGDB is another source that can be used to develop inventories of
abandoned and inactive mine lands, as well as to determine
baseline and background concentrations of various natural
materials. The NGDB consists of more than 2 million records from
samples of stream sediments, soils, rocks, waters, panned
concentrates, drill cores, and vegetation. The data were
collected during geochemical surveys conducted by the USGS and
other federal agencies, such as the Department of Energy's
extensive National Uranium Resource Evaluation, Hydrogeochemical
and Stream Sediment Reconnaissance (NURE HSSR). Two other
databases that are part of the NGDB are the Rock Analysis Storage
System (RASS) and PLUTO, which contain geochemical data for rock,
soil, sediment, and plants. Samples from which data in the NGDB
were generated are held in archival storage and are available for
further analysis.
The USGS databases related to mining and the environment are
available in paper and electronic forms, which are increasingly
interactive. The NURE HSSR data from stream sediments and soils
cover a large proportion of the conterminous United States at a
scale of one sample per square mile. The portion of the NGDB
containing the NURE HSSR data for the western United States has
been published as USGS Publication DDS-1, using CD-ROM
technology. USGS has recently begun to publish state-by-state
summaries of available data related to mining sites. A series of
USGS Open-File Reports (OFRs) contain data for a given state from
MRDS, NGDB, and the MILS/MAS database on mining sites developed
by the U.S. Bureau of Mines; these data are compiled as
compressed files on a single floppy diskette. Data reports have
been completed for the States of Colorado (OFR 94-579), Idaho
(OFR 95-644), Montana (OFR 95-229), and New Mexico (OFR 95-528).
Other western states, including Arizona and California, will be
completed during federal FY 1995 and FY 1996.
Evaluation of water-quality data can be a useful step in
prioritizing mine sites for remediation, in terms of recognizing
the magnitude of environmental impacts on stream reaches. USGS
water- quality databases provide an accessible resource to
support this type of evaluation. Water-quality data collected by
USGS are stored in the QWDATA program, which is accessible and
searchable on line. QWDATA is part of the National Water
Information System (NWIS 1), which also includes other databases
with comprehensive information on ground-water and surface-water
measurements conducted by the USGS. On a regular basis, the
water-quality data in QWDATA are uploaded into WATSTORE, a
centralized system that interfaces with EPA's STORET database. A
major upgrade of NWIS 1 to NWIS 2 is under way. NWIS 2 will
replace WATSTORE and NWIS 1 in FY 1996 or FY 1997 with a
relational and discipline-integrated database containing basic
data storage and processing capabilities as well as an index of
data and sources.
Assessments of Abandoned Mine Lands in Colorado
The BLM and the USFS are currently charged with identifying and
prioritizing for remediation tens of thousands of abandoned mine
sites in Colorado. The USGS, in cooperation with the State of
Colorado's Geological Survey and the BLM, has developed a
geology-based regional screening process that was used to
identify and rank Colorado mining districts according to their
likely mine drainage hazards. This screening process allows land
management agencies to focus their remedial efforts rapidly on
mining districts with the greatest potential for environmental
problems, thereby avoiding costly, detailed field assessments of
all mining districts.
The BLM, USFS, and other federal agencies are proposing that EPA
use this geology-based regional screening approach to help assign
and assess stormwater permits for multiple abandoned mine sites
on public lands. The mining industry can also use this
geology-based screening approach to improve prediction, planning,
and mitigation of the environmental consequences of
mineral-resource development.
SITE CHARACTERIZATION
The USGS conducts numerous detailed studies of individual mine
sites to determine: 1) geochemical backgrounds (natural
concentrations of elements in natural materials that exclude
human influence) and baselines (elemental concentrations that may
include human influence, measured at a specific time), 2)
environmental impacts of mineral and energy development, 3)
sources and effects of mining-related contamination, and 4)
likely consequences of proposed remedial alternatives.
Three examples follow of USGS site characterization studies in
areas affected by mining. At Summitville, Colorado, the USGS
has integrated studies from several disciplines to characterize
the mine site as well as the surrounding environment. At the
Penn Mine in California, the USGS has performed detailed
characterization of the hydrogeology and geochemistry of a
fractured-rock aquifer contaminated by acid mine drainage. At
Iron Mountain, California, the USGS sampled and analyzed water
and solids from underground mine workings and from a downstream
reservoir receiving the acidic drainage. At all three of these
sites, the USGS studies have provided important data and
information that will improve the effectiveness of regulatory and
remedial actions.
Summitville, Colorado
Open-pit gold mining at Summitville, Colorado, led to increased
acid drainage and leaks of cyanide-bearing processing solutions
into the Wightman Fork of the Alamosa River. These environmental
problems are of concern because of the extensive downstream use
of Alamosa River water for livestock, agricultural irrigation,
and wildlife habitat. USGS studies have provided unbiased
geoscience information on the Summitville Mine and its downstream
environmental effects (1). These studies included acid drainage
and cyanide geochemistry on site, effects on the Alamosa River
and Terrace Reservoir, and effects on soils, agriculture, and
wetlands downstream in the San Luis Valley. This information is
being used by: 1) EPA to help improve site remediation; 2) the
State of Colorado, land management agencies, and the mining
industry to help understand and prevent similar environmental
problems at other mines; and 3) downstream water users such as
farmers, water conservancy districts, and the Alamosa National
Wildlife Refuge (managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
to evaluate the potential impacts of Summitville on agriculture
and wildlife ecosystems.
Studies of 1993 alfalfa and barley crops showed that metal
concentrations in crops irrigated with water affected by acid
mine drainage from Summitville were far below toxic levels and
were well within concentration ranges measured in alfalfa and
barley crops elsewhere in the United States. In fact, local
farmers felt that increased copper levels measured in the alfalfa
crops have actually increased the value of the alfalfa because
copper is an essential nutrient for cattle.
Penn Mine, California
In cooperation with the State of California and a regional water
district, the USGS conducted a study of ground-water flow and
metal transport in an area contaminated by acid drainage from
sulfide mine wastes and from underground workings at the Penn
Mine, which produced copper, zinc, lead, and gold from massive
sulfide deposits in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Borehole
geophysical techniques, including acoustic televiewer and
heat-pulse flowmeter, were used to determine the location and
orientation of hydraulically active fracture zones in a
structurally complex metamorphic rock terrain.
Inflatable packers were installed in boreholes to separate rock
types and to isolate fracture zones for geochemical sampling,
water-level measurements, and hydraulic testing. Naturally
occurring stable isotopes of hydrogen and oxygen in water were
used as tracers to determine the origin of ground water in a
contaminated plume flowing from an unlined impoundment to a fresh
water reservoir. Several hundred feet upgradient, USGS drilled
into underground mine workings and determined the relative
proportion of contamination seeping from the underground workings
and from surficial waste-rock piles using naturally occurring
chemical tracers. Results of the USGS investigations are being
used by the responsible parties in planning cost-effective
remediation efforts for the site.
Iron Mountain, California
Acid mine drainage from Iron Mountain is among the most
metal-rich ever detected and represents a serious environmental
threat to the Sacramento River in northern California. The
inactive mines in the Iron Mountain area yielded several million
tons of massive sulfide ore from which copper, zinc, gold,
silver, and pyrite (for sulfuric acid) were produced. Several
million tons of ore remain in the ground, however, exposed to air
and percolating ground water. The volcanic host rocks have
little capacity to neutralize acid, creating an extreme degree of
sulfuric acid production and metal mobility.
USGS has worked with EPA and other federal and state agencies
since the mid-1980s to determine effective remediation strategies
as part of EPA's Superfund project. This work has included
underground sampling of mine waters (including documentation of
highly unusual negative pH values) and mineralogic study of
secondary sulfate salts that accumulated in the underground mine
workings. Geochemical modeling of mine plugging scenarios shows
that salt dissolution would contribute significant quantities of
acid and ferric iron to the mine water, leading to continued
sulfide oxidation and unacceptable risks. Mass-balance analysis
determined separate drainage contributions from two adjacent
mines, one of which could not be plugged. This analysis
encouraged the construction of a lime neutralization plant, which
has reduced loadings of copper, zinc, and cadmium by about 80
percent.
USGS has also studied the geochemistry and aquatic toxicity of
metal-rich sediment and pore water in Keswick Reservoir, which
receives the acid drainage from Iron Mountain in the Sacramento
River system. USGS is cooperating with EPA and other federal and
state agencies to develop a remediation strategy for these
contaminated sediments that is cost-effective and environmentally
sound.
MONITORING AND ANALYSIS
Monitoring activities are essential in evaluating the extent of
contamination as well as the degree of remedial success and
failure. The USGS continues to be recognized nationally and
internationally as a leader in the development of field methods,
sampling protocols, and analytical procedures that result in
high-quality, reliable, and reproducible data on chemical and
physical properties of geologic materials.
The USGS conducts a wide variety of systematic monitoring
activities that provide useful data and information regarding
mined lands. Spatial and temporal studies of watersheds include
long-term records of stream flow and associated water-quality
data, including geochemistry and suspended-sediment loading.
Long-term and spatially comprehensive data records enable
calibration of robust models of surface- and ground-water
hydrology and contaminant transport. (The development of such
models is described briefly in the next section.) Geophysical
data, including extensive remote sensing files, are archived by
the USGS and are available to the public.
PROCESS-ORIENTED STUDIES OF CONTAMINANT ORIGIN, TRANSPORT, AND
FATE
A distinct strength of the USGS as a scientific organization is
its ability to conduct long-term research on geologic and
hydrologic processes at sites where the geologic and hydrologic
frameworks are well known. The USGS began the Toxic Substances
Hydrology (Toxics) Program in 1982 to study, in an
interdisciplinary manner, the fate and effects of toxic
substances in the environment. The objectives of the Toxics
Program are to provide earth-science information that can be used
to help prevent or mitigate contamination of the nation's ground-
and surface-water resources, and to develop methods of sampling,
analysis, and data interpretation for use in water-quality
assessments, site investigation, and remediation.
Several field sites affected by mining have been sites of long-term
USGS research as part of the Toxics Program, including Pinal
Creek (Globe-Miami mining district), Arizona; the Upper Arkansas
River (Leadville mining district), Colorado; Tar Creek (Picher
mining area), Oklahoma and Kansas; and the Whitewood Creek-Belle
Fourche River system (Lead and Deadwood mining areas), South
Dakota. (See (2) for a bibliography of publications and brief
descriptions of study areas.) The Toxics Project also provided
some of the funding for USGS studies at Iron Mountain,
California; Summitville, Colorado; and Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
An important aspect of USGS research is the continuing
development of widely used hydrologic and geochemical models
based on fundamental principles. In certain situations, and with
careful attention to assumptions and uncertainties, such models
can be used in a predictive mode to estimate the consequences of
remedial actions and to demonstrate the need for filling critical
data gaps to reduce the uncertainty of costly remediation
decisions.
A summary of USGS research in the upper Arkansas River area is
presented as an example of the multidisciplinary nature of
studies in the Toxics Program.
Upper Arkansas River, Colorado
Heavy metals from years of mining in the Leadville, Colorado,
area enter into the Arkansas River as a result of acid mine
drainage and runoff from numerous piles of waste rock and
tailings. The metals and the acidic conditions exert a toxic
effect on aquatic life. This site represents a classic acidic
mine drainage setting where aluminum, cadmium, copper, iron,
lead, manganese, and zinc are present in high concentrations.
Headwater streams typically are changed by acid, metal-rich
inflows over short distances. The pattern of metal concentration
downstream from the inflows is a result of the interplay of
streamflow and chemical processes; both dilution and metal
precipitation can cause decreased metal concentrations
downstream.
The USGS has studied diverse hydrologic settings in mountain
streams using tracer injections to quantify discharge and metal
loads in the streams. This has provided information to prepare
computer simulations of the transport and chemical reactions in
the streams, allowing characterization of specific sites
efficiently with noninvasive techniques. Two unique aspects of
the USGS studies have been the ability to draw upon many diverse
sites and synthesize the findings and to study the chemical
reactions of metals in the context of stream transport. This
watershed approach to understanding the impact of mine drainage
can be more readily applied to management decisions.
The USGS research in the upper Arkansas River area has been at
the forefront of understanding several important processes that
influence the fate of metal contamination in mountain streams and
rivers: 1) cycling of metals by iron photoreduction, 2) effects
of photosynthesis on metals, and 3) importance of colloids in the
transport of metals downstream from mining.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The material in this paper is based on USGS fact sheets and
briefing sheets prepared by staff scientists in the Office of
Mineral Resources and the Office of Water Quality. Copies of
pertinent fact sheets and briefing sheets can be obtained by
contacting the chiefs of these offices (see below). Other
information was provided by Briant Kimball, Sherman Marsh,
William R. Miller, Geoff Plumlee, G. Robert Robinson, and Marc
Sylvester. Constructive reviews of the manuscript by D. Kirk
Nordstrom, David W. Morganwalp, and Sherman Marsh are greatly
appreciated.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
For more information, contact:
Chief, Office of Mineral Resources
U.S. Geological Survey
913 National Center
Reston, VA 22092
Tel: (703) 648-6100
Fax: (703) 648-6057
e-mail: whwhite@usgs.gov
Project Chief, Mineral Resources Data System
U.S. Geological Survey
913 National Center
Reston, VA 22092
Tel: (703) 648-6198
Tel: (703) 648-6198
Chief, Office of Water Quality
U.S. Geological Survey
412 National Center
Reston, VA 22092
Tel: (703) 648-6861
Fax: (703) 648-5295
e-mail: drickert@usgs.gov
Chief, National Water Quality Assessment Program
U.S. Geological Survey
413 National Center
Reston, VA 22092
Tel: (703) 648-6868
Fax: (703) 648-5722
e-mail: tlmiller@usgs.gov
Leader, USGS Mine Drainage Interest Group
U.S. Geological Survey
2800 Cottage Way, Room, W-2233
Sacramento, CA 95825
Tel: (916) 979-2615, ext. 356
Fax: (916) 979-2668
e-mail: cnalpers@usgs.gov
USGS Home Pages on the World Wide Web
The World Wide Web (WWW) system allows rapid access to text,
graphics, video, and sound. Special software (a "web browser")
is needed to access the USGS home pages. The Uniform Resource
Locators (URL's) for several USGS home pages with information
pertinent to mining and the environment are listed below.
USGS home page
http://www.usgs.gov/
USGS Mineral Resource Surveys Program
http://minerals.er.usgs.gov/
USGS Water Resources Information
http://water.usgs.gov/index.html
USGS NAWQA Program
http://wwwrvares.er.usgs.gov/nawqa/nawqa_home.html
USGS Mine Drainage Interest Group
http://water.wr.usgs.gov/mine/home.html
REFERENCES
1. King, T.V.V., ed. 1995. Environmental considerations of
active and abandoned mine lands lessons from Summitville,
Colorado. U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 2220.
2. Morganwalp, D.W., compiler. 1994. Bibliography of
publications from the Toxic Substances Hydrology Program,
U.S. Geological Survey. U.S. Geological Survey Open-File
Report
94-91.
For additional information see also:
Plumlee, G.S., S.M. Smith, M.I. Toth, and S.P. Marsh. 1993.
Integrated mineral-resource and mineral-environmental
assessments of public lands Applications for land management
and resource planning. U.S. Geological Survey Open-File
Report 93-571.
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