EPA mercury deadline now OctoberBy ADELLA HARDING - Mining Quarterly
Published: Friday, August 21, 2009 12:36 PM CDT
ELKO The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now has until the end of October to come up with a national standard for mercury air emissions for the gold mining industry.
EPA notified the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection this week the federal agency and environmental community agreed to extend the court-mandated deadline from Aug. 15 to continue negotiations, NDEP Public Information Officer Jill Lufrano said.
The planned federal regulations are an EPA compromise with the Sierra Club as part of a lawsuit that initially didn’t include gold mines, and compromise sparked Nevada mining industry concerns that state and federal regulations may conflict with each other.
While the proposed rule still presents significant uncertainty for Nevada’s highly effective Mercury Air Control Program, NDEP continues to work vigorously with state industry to substantially reduce mercury air emissions, Lufrano said.
The Nevada mining industry is concerned about how mines can work under both state and federal regulations especially in light of a new phase of state regulations taking effect this summer.
The industry is meeting with NDEP to find ways for phase two to work without a huge risk of duplication, said Nevada Mining Association President Tim Crowley. There is a little bit of guesswork in there.
The industry expects to use the best technology to control mercury air emissions, but companies don’t want to invest in technologies that will later conflict with the federal program’s standards, he said this week.
The industry filed a petition in June with the Nevada Environmental Commission in response to EPA’s planned regulations but dropped the petition before a hearing.
The mining association asked in the petition that NDEP put a hold on the second phase of the program and evaluate its mercury emissions program with an eye to potential conflicts with federal regulations.
The EPA surprised the state and gold producers late last year by agreeing as part of the Sierra Club lawsuit settlement to put together federal regulations for mercury emissions from gold mines.
The Sierra Club asked for a federal mercury rule as a quid pro quo as the EPA sought more time to develop mercury regulations for other industries. The agency gained an extension to July 13, 2010, for those regulations.
The industry and state agency were surprised because EPA supported Nevada’s program for reducing mercury air emissions from gold mines and agreed federal standards weren’t necessary. The largest gold mines in the nation are in Nevada.
NDEP had filed a request in January to intervene in the Sierra Club lawsuit in hopes of blocking duplicate regulations, but a district court in Washington, D.C., rejected the state’s request in May.
Mercury emissions from gold operations mainly come from mills when mines are processing the ore. Mercury is a natural heavy metal that in large quantities is toxic to the brain and body tissues. A U.S. Geological Survey study released earlier this week found traces of mercury in every fish tested in 291 streams across the country.
The study found that emissions from coal-fired power plants were the main source of mercury that reached streams and was converted into methylmercury, but there also were high levels detected in 59 streams in the West. The study said mining may be contributing to the mercury levels.
NDEP started Nevada’s mandatory mercury control program in 2006 but the agency and largest mining operations started a voluntary program in 2001 to reduce air emissions.
The state agency’s mercury air emission figures for 2007 totaled 4,893 pounds released, compared with 21,098 pounds in 2001.
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